Last week we discussed how to responsibly enjoy wild spaces with our dogs. Yet dogs are not the only pet that harms wildlife. In Canada, the largest direct human-caused killer of birds is domestic cats, whose depredations far exceed the deaths caused by collisions with windows, wind turbines, and cars combined ¹. Bird are especially vulnerable to pets this time of year as their babies leave the nest, but still cannot fly well enough to escape a determined predator ². As with dogs, time spent avoiding cats is time taken from incubating and feeding young.

Above: The top human-linked activities/objects that directly kill Canadian birds alive today ¹⁴. Since estimating population declines due to…

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