“The Australian government is taking extreme measures to kill two million feral cats by 2020 . She had already announced this in 2015. Now the plan should be implemented.”

Government wants to poison millions of cats with sausages: This is how an article begins on a topic that unsettles many Internet users and we are asked to fact-check this topic.

Screenshot of the requests via our Facebook group
Screenshot of the requests via our Facebook group

The fact check

Yes, it's real - the article refers to the Australian government's 5-year plan to decimate feral cats. ( We reported )

This 5-year program aims to kill around 2 million feral cats in Australia from 2015 to 2020.

According to the New York Times and Inverse , a sausage made from kangaroo meat and chicken fat will be used. Hidden inside is a pellet filled with poison, colloquially known as “1080”. It acts on the central nervous system. The recipe comes from Dr. Dave Algar and was given the name “Eradicat®”.

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An Australian government report says baiting is recognized as “the most effective method of feral cat control where there is no risk to non-target species”. Native animals are said to be tolerant to the poison because components of it occur naturally in the “Gastrolobium” plant and the Australian fauna has evolved alongside this colorful, poisonous plant.

Other methods approved by the Australian government currently include catching the feral cats and shooting them. The decision to decimate or “eliminate” wild cats has already angered animal rights activists in particular in the past .

There are, of course, concerns about whether these sausages are humane. A document from 1996 – feral cats in Australia have long been a problem – addressed the question of how painful it is for an animal to be killed via “1080”. The final sentence states that fluoroacetate poisoning in dogs is not associated with pain.

PETA Australia, the Brigitte Bardot Foundation and many other animal rights activist groups still argue that culling is generally inhumane and sterilization is a more ethical choice.

Since European settlers came to the island with non-native animals, 130 native species have become extinct. There are currently between 2.1 and 6.3 million feral cats living in Australia.

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Conclusion:

Yes, the Australian government has decided to poison millions of cats with sausages. The cats are not pets, but feral cats. The debate that feral cats threaten Australia's native fauna has been going on for several years. It is a controversial topic on which opinions differ greatly.

Article image: Shutterstock / By evgenii mitroshin


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Notes:
1) This content reflects the current state of affairs at the time of publication. The reproduction of individual images, screenshots, embeds or video sequences serves to discuss the topic. 2) Individual contributions were created through the use of machine assistance and were carefully checked by the Mimikama editorial team before publication. ( Reason )