Cat ate a bird, whole....(I think)

[Otispunkmeyer]

Cat came rushing in today as usual (in and out like a yo yo, so just ignore it), and went under my desk while I was working. Above the sounds of YouTube, I heard high pitched chirping....

She's got a live bird! A baby chick. I tried to get it off her but she ran off with it. When I found her again I couldn't find the bird and she was licking her chops. I have no idea now weather she ate it whole, has hidden it, or took it back outside.

Later she brought, possibly, another one. Left it crawling on the floor. Tiny, eyes not even open, no feathers, looked like a slightly furry testical with legs. I took it back outside to get rid. Then she brought another!!! (May have been the same one, but this one was more alive...despite two large teeth marks). Managed to keep her in the house after that!!!

So possibly, she's raided a nest of 3 new born birds and has potentially eaten one whole.

Gonna have to keep an eye on her now? I presume a newly born chick would probably have very soft, weak bones so hopefully she won't be trying to st a skeleton later!!!

Currently lying on me in bed now, happy as Larry. The little bint.

[Boosted LS1]

Tiz ok.

Time to worry is if they eat swans or geese.

[nickwilcock]

I was at a pub by a river once, sitting with a beer watching the ducks and their offspring.

All of a sudden, a cat appeared and grabbed one of the ducklings.

Mistake! Mother Mallard wasn't having any of that and proceeded to peck the living daylights out of the cat, until it dropped the duckling and slunk off after receiving a final hard peck on the arse.

Cue applause from everyone who'd been watching!

Cat looked rather embarrassed...

Edited by nickwilcock on Monday 3rd July 19:13

[thebraketester]

I fking hate cats.

[edc]

Out in the wild cats don't have opposable thumbs to open tinned food or tear open pouches. An occasional chick should be fine. From time to time one of mine will catch a Starling or Blackbird and finish off most of that. The most I see is some remains of feathers. Until I moved, the same cat would come back at least once every week, and that's just the times I saw, between late April and end of June with a newt in his mouth. I was never quite sure exactly where they were coming from but about 30% of the time I could rescue it and get it back in the undergrowth.

[StoatInACoat]

Ours has recently got into the habit of leaving headless birds in the lounge and I haven't noticed her stting out little skulls. Not sure if that would be more or less horrific than the current CSI style corpses adorning the hall mat in the morning.

[jmorgan]

One of ours would just leave the giblets. Must have had a small cat butchery set. Having seen another swallow mouse whole, tail vanishing down as we tried to get the mouse....
title bugger looked smug at that.

Think your puss will be OK.

[Yertis]

This is why I despise cats.

[williredale]

When I was younger our cat caught and killed a pheasant. Silly bugger couldn't get it through the cat flap though!

[dingg]

Father in laws cat once brought a pigeon in through the catflap early hours of the morning , pigeon managed to escape in the lounge
cue lots of chasing by the cat - he had to decorate the whole lounge - looked like a slaughterhouse.

I'm not keen on cats

[Munter]

When I had them one of ours got a Pidgin in through the flap.

They ate everything except the wings and one foot. Lovely.

[anonymous-user]

I despise of cats for this reason too.

I also despise owners who do not put bells on their cats to give the birds a chance.

We are losing much wildlife, especially birds, because of this.

[LordHaveMurci]

We have two cats, we live on the edge of open countryside.

Our cats bring in quite a few mice, sometimes they have the decency to kill them! Very rarely do they bring in birds thankfully.

I'm sure your cat will be fine OP.

[V12 Virgin]

Neighbours cat frequently kills things- Recently had been bringing home baby rabbits every day- half the time they'd be half alive when the cats polished them off. They also seem to have a thing for playing with frogs. They'll just wack them and make them squeal and then get bored and leave it to die. I truly hate cats.

[Munter]

garyhun said:

We are losing much wildlife, especially birds, because of this.

In the inner city though they do a lovely job of keeping the rat population under control. I would guess it was about a 20:1 ratio of Rats to Birds.

[jmorgan]

I read, in some publication, that there is no reliable count.

However, lets forget the way we humans trash the place and blame it on tigger. It is for the professionally offended I think.

[RammyMP]

Our little bugger regularly brings home birds and mice, shows them to us to show how clever he is then eats them. He occasionally leaves a few legs.

The fker left this by the back door a while back:

[anonymous-user]

jmorgan said:

I read, in some publication, that there is no reliable count.

However, lets forget the way we humans trash the place and blame it on tigger. It is for the professionally offended I think.

About 1/4 of a billion in total with about 50 million birds, according to the RSPCA.

[MG CHRIS]

Yertis said:

This is why I despise cats.

What doing something that cats have always done hunt for food. Its still part of their instincts.

[Digitalize]

It's an animal, it's a carnivore, it eats other animals. The cat will be fine. During spring ours catches probably 4 or 5 baby rabbits a week, great as it means we have to barely feed him. As they grow they start to get a bit quick to catch but he still brings back the old adult one now and then.