Cats might outnumber people in feline-friendly Cyprus

The land of cats has a feline problem.

Officials successful Cyprus, the small land federation successful the eastbound country of the Mediterranean, estimation astir 1 feral feline for each 1 of its million-strong quality population, though activists contend the existent colonisation is hundreds of thousands higher.

In September the island’s parliamentary situation committee was told an existing sterilisation programme is too constricted to incorporate the burgeoning feline population.

Change mightiness beryllium connected the way, but backing unsocial won’t solve Cyprus’s feline problem.

Appearing to heed calls for much funding, Environment Minister Maria Panayiotou announced connected October 4 – World Animal Day – that the authorities would rise yearly feline sterilisation backing to 300,000 euros ($A530,000). The determination was hailed arsenic a important step forward.

Given cats’ predatory nature, a ample colonisation not lone has the imaginable to wreak havoc with the island’s ecosystem, but it could origin undue suffering for feral felines roaming car-choked streets successful hunt of nutrient and shelter.

Cyprus has a agelong past arsenic a cat-loving federation where feline nutrient dispensaries and clusters of small houses are a regular show on fashionable footpaths.

Two decades ago, French archaeologists unearthed what they believed to beryllium the earliest grounds of a domesticated feline successful a 9500-year-old neolithic village. They recovered the bones of a feline adjacent to the skeletal remains of a human, suggesting that they were buried together.

Adding to this agelong past of human-feline transportation is the 4th period fable of Saint Helen who, aft uncovering the True Cross successful the Holy Lands, brought implicit a mates of boatloads of cats to woody with a snake infestation. A monastery that serves arsenic a feline harmless haven, St. Nicholas of the Cats, still exists today.

With tourism a cardinal economical operator for Cyprus, the island’s cats person go a large attraction for the millions of vacationers who descend connected the land each year.

The well-fed felines are a communal sight, often seen feasting connected leftovers provided by visitors astatine the plethora of restaurants where they similar to bent out.

Source: AP