The HSUS agrees with wildlife conservationists that owned cats can be kept happily indoors, and the humane movement has devoted significant resources over the past decade messaging to the public on this point. That's the reason that the percentage of indoor cats has risen from 52 percent to 64 percent over the past 15 years. We also agree that cats should be spayed and neutered, and our movement has invested millions of dollars in a constant and ongoing effort to promote, perform, fund, or facilitate such surgeries for both owned and unowned outdoor cats. Should anyone really believe that on top of these reasoned and compassionate efforts, we should be out there killing every cat in sight?
No community in American history has killed its way out of the outdoor cat problem. We've reached a point at which there are millions of cats living outdoors. It is regrettable that so many conservationists have trained their fire on one element of the humane movement's comprehensive strategy for outdoor cat management and reduction -- Trap, Neuter, and Return (TNR) -- which works to stop reproduction, with an end goal of no unowned cats on the landscape. This is a relatively new addition to a full-throttle program aimed at suppressing the numbers of cats living outdoors. In this strategy, unowned cats living outdoors are trapped, sterilized and returned to where they came from. Cat caregivers are trained and engaged to ensure high rates of sterilization, and to prevent local wildlife from eating food provided to cats. We work with practitioners all over the country to ensure that effective and efficient best practices are used and believe that these targeted and strategic efforts will produce measurable results in the years ahead. Although no single control method is suitable for all situations, TNR can be combined with a combination of strategies to create programs that address specific needs and maximize available resources in a community. These include: