Thanks for bringing this to my attention,
@Amber Freiwald-I don't check in here as often as I should!
I know a bit about the groups
@Danielle Bays mentions, and I've heard some good things about Fort Hood in El Paso, TX (and can gather more details if that would be helpful).
Although I'd certainly like to see the policies change, I'm afraid it's going to be a heavy lift-as indicated in
this recent article from Lance McDaniel, environmental division director for Naval Air Station Patuxent River. Now feeding cats is putting pilots' lives at risk? We all know vultures are attracted to roadkill-so, following McDaniel's line of reasoning, we should really be restricting
driving near the base, right...?
I would imagine all branches of the military lean heavily on guidance from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service in such matters, and I think we all know what their (unofficial) position on free-roaming cats is. (When pressed, they'll
admit they don't actually have a position, but then go and do whatever they can to oppose TNR efforts.) Adding fuel to the fire is opposition at the state level, as demonstrated in the Association of Fish & Wildlife Agencies' "Toolkit to Address Free-ranging Domestic Cats (
Felis catus) on Agency Lands Managed for Native Wildlife and Ecosystem Health," (
PDF) published last year.
While we generally do pretty well at the local level, the push for even modest progress at the state and federal level is much more difficult. I think it's a real shame when it comes to military policies-a military base would seem to be "low-hanging fruit" in so many ways when it comes to targeted TNR (e.g., healthy and fit "workforce," lots of structure in place for monitoring, etc.).
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Peter Wolf
Best Friends Animal Society
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Original Message:
Sent: 09-29-2021 10:42 AM
From: Amber Freiwald
Subject: what is your experience with community cats on military bases?
Hi @Peter Wolf do you have any insights to share re: Danielle's question? Thx!!!
I believe you may have talked about TNR on military bases on a HASS/Maddie's call in June...
Best -
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Thank you all for all you do!
Amber Freiwald
Maddie's Fund
Original Message:
Sent: 09-27-2021 03:26 PM
From: danielle bays
Subject: what is your experience with community cats on military bases?
Have you or your organization tried to manage community cats on a military base? Attempted to work with the base to do TNR or deal with a growing outdoor cat population on a base?
The U.S. military has some old and often stringent rules about stray animals on bases. A number of organizations have tried to address the issues on the base level with little traction (even though they have great names like Cat Team 7 and Operation Git-Meow).
I'm doing some research to better understand the scope of the issue and identify where there may be some pivot points. I'd like to hear about your experiences.
#CommunityCatManagement
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Danielle Bays
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