The Coyote Was Always There. Your Cat Wasn't.
Let me say something that is going to ruffle some feathers. If your cat wants to go outside, that is YOUR problem to solve. It is not the problem of the coyote that lives in your neighborhood, it is not your neighbor’s problem, it is not your community’s problem.
Letting your cat outside means you are changing the lives of hundreds and thousands of little animals, with no concern for them. YOUR cat, that YOU are responsible for, is going outside and making life harder for wildlife.
They already have to deal with buildings, fires, trash, windows, chemicals, pesticides, poison, guns, hunting, and people.
And now they also have to deal with YOUR pet.
What it actually looks like
I was around 13 when our cat Benji started bringing his hunting home with him.
We did not have air conditioning, so windows were open all summer. I can still hear the sound of him catching baby bunnies in the backyard.
The screaming.
I am not being dramatic when I say I still have nightmares about it. I went downstairs and threw open the back door, but by the time I got there, Benji and the bunny were long gone.
He also brought live birds into the house. Which is its own special chaos.
And then there was Gus.
Gus never came home one night. My dad went out searching for him and found what he thought was our beautiful grey and white cat. He couldn’t tell for sure, because his body was soaked through from the Chicago summer storms.
Gus was hit by a car.
We buried what we hoped was our cat and tried to move on.
By the time I was around 12 I was already asking my parents to keep the cats inside. As a kid, I had figured out that the indoor/outdoor life was not the freedom it looked like.
Most adults have not gotten there yet. I get it. Because it requires admitting that a habit you thought was kindness is actually costing your cat more than you realized.
The "that animal is fine" problem
Here is something most people do not know.
When a cat catches a bird or small animal and you manage to get it away from them, the instinct is to look it over, see no visible wounds, and release it thinking everything is okay.
It is probably not okay.
Cat saliva contains bacteria that are highly pathogenic to birds and small mammals. A single bite or scratch, even one you cannot see, introduces an infection that is almost always fatal within 24 to 48 hours without immediate treatment.
The animal walks (or flies!) away and dies alone somewhere.
If you ever find a bird or animal that has been in a cat's mouth, get it to a wildlife rehabilitator immediately. Do not release it and hope for the best.
The lifespan math alone should end this debate
Indoor cats live an average of 12 to 18 years.
Outdoor cats live 2 to 5 years.
That is not a rounding error. That is a decade of life.
A 2022 UC Davis study of over 3,100 cats confirmed it. (PLOS One, 2022) The risks are not theoretical: cars, predators, other cats, disease, toxins, weather, and people who do not share your affection for animals.
Any one of these can end an outdoor cat's life on any given Tuesday.
Most outdoor cats encounter all of them regularly.
The wildlife piece is not a footnote
This is where it gets uncomfortable.
The Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute and the US Fish and Wildlife Service estimated that cats kill between 1.3 and 4 billion birds and between 6.3 and 22.3 billion mammals in the United States every year. (Nature Communications, 2013)
Billion. Not million.
American Bird Conservancy puts the bird number at 2.4 billion annually, making cats the single greatest source of direct human-caused bird mortality in the country. They have contributed to at least 63 species extinctions globally and are listed as one of the world's 100 worst invasive species. (American Bird Conservancy)
Here is the part that catches people off guard.
Your well-fed, beloved house cat who gets premium food and annual checkups still kills. A full stomach does not switch off a predatory instinct that is millions of years in the making.
The average indoor/outdoor pet cat kills around two animals per week.
And the damage is not just in the killing. Research shows that the mere presence of cats changes bird feeding and nesting behavior, even when no cat ever makes contact with a bird. (Catster, 2026)
The stress alone drives wildlife away from habitat they depend on.
Cats and the food chain. Both ways.
Here is something that does not get talked about enough.
When people let their cats outside, they are not just adding a predator to the local ecosystem. They are adding a prey animal too.
Coyotes eat cats.
Hawks eat cats.
Owls eat cats.
Fisher cats eat cats.
Foxes eat cats.
These are not freak incidents. These are predators doing exactly what predators do, in the habitat they have always lived in. These animals obviously do NOT know that your precious baby that goes outside is your precious baby. These animals just see a moving animal that they can catch.
Every single week on Nextdoor and Ring groups across the country, someone posts a panicked warning: COYOTE SPOTTED IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD, KEEP YOUR PETS INSIDE.
Here is the thing.
The coyote was always there.
Coyotes do not move into neighborhoods. Neighborhoods move into coyote territory. They have been living in those fields and hills and creek beds since long before the subdivision went up. Your outdoor cat is not a resident of their ecosystem.
Your outdoor cat is a snack in their ecosystem.
This is not a tragedy. This is an ecological transaction.
The tragedy is that it was completely preventable.
And on the other side of that same coin: every bird, every vole, every chipmunk your cat kills is a meal removed from the food chain. Hawks depend on those small mammals. Foxes depend on them. Owls hunt them at night. When cats hollow out the small mammal and bird populations in an area, every predator up the chain feels it.
Your cat is not a neutral participant in the local ecosystem.
They are a disruptor in both directions simultaneously, and the ecosystem did not invite them.
A note on the "cats are natural predators" argument
Yes. They are.
They are also a non-native invasive species in virtually every ecosystem.
The birds and mammals they are killing in your backyard did not evolve alongside them. They have no natural defenses against a predator that efficient.
"Natural" does not mean "without consequence."
The "my cat would be miserable inside" argument
I hear this one a lot.
What it usually means is: “my cat has never been given the indoor enrichment they need, so they are bored, and I interpret boredom as a need for outdoor access.”
A cat with a catio, window perches, puzzle feeders, regular play sessions, and vertical space to climb is not a miserable indoor cat.
They are a cat whose needs are being met.
The actually good options
Catios. An enclosed outdoor structure attached to a window or door. Fresh air, sun, birds to watch, zero mortality risk. They range from a DIY window box to a full backyard enclosure. This is the gold standard.
Harness and leash walks. More cats adapt to this than you would think, especially when introduced young. Not for every cat, but for those who take to it, genuinely enriching. I actually tried with both my cats, and they both hated it. Khaleesi used to flop right onto her side and become an unmovable object.
Window perches and a bird feeder outside the glass. Hours of stimulation. Zero casualties.
Real play. Twenty minutes with a wand toy does more for a cat's mental and physical health than most people realize. Cats are sprinters. Short, intense, regular play sessions fulfill the hunt drive that outdoor roaming is doing in a much more dangerous way.
The bottom line
You love your cat. I know you do, because I loved Benji and I loved Gus. I also love Tom Waits and I loved Khaleesi.
Letting them come and go feels like love because it feels like freedom.
But the data is clear, and so is the lived experience. Indoor/outdoor cats live shorter lives, and they take a toll on wildlife along the way.
The alternative is not deprivation.
It is just a different kind of effort.
Your cat, and the birds outside your window, are worth it.
