by Mac Slavo, SHTF Plan:

Domestic cats in the United States are beloved pets but they can also be a major threat to birds and other wildlife. After the domestic cat was introduced to the United States by European colonists, the number of domestic cats has skyrocketed in the past 40 years.

Today, more than 100 million feral and outdoor cats are loose in neighborhoods and wildlife habitats nationwide. There are so many of them that they are classified as an invasive species with extinction-level impacts. According to several studies, cats kill between 1.3–4 billion birds and 6.3–22.3 billion mammals in the U.S. per year; making them the largest human-influenced source of mortality for birds and mammals in the country.