Thread: Taumarunui golf club cat / Facebook mob

Originally Posted by mimms2

Seems perfectly reasonable to me?
What would you do if some rabid cat-feeding bookface twat was filming you? You know there's no reasoning with a karen...

If you don't want "your" cat shot, keep it on your place, with a fluro collar and a bell.

Pretty simple isn't it? I also wish people would stop dumping unwanted pets in rural areas. I could open a KFC with all the roosters dumped around us.

Originally Posted by vulcannz

While I despise cats that is not true. Companion cats are protected under law as a companion animal, and unlike dogs have a right to trespass. You can kill feral cats, but must be very careful to identify them properly.

That said it sounds like he was shooting at a built up area, and clearly with people around. Guy appears to be an idiot.

So how the hell do you tell the difference .

For the purpose of covering my own arse and those of my neighbours where we remove pest cats (trapping & shooting), I took a look at the claim that as companion animals, pet cats have legal protection to trespass onto other people’s properties (see post #5).

Words to this effect can be found on numerous cat enthusiast websites, as well as in some of the media articles about this golf club incident. But it is also mentioned on legal websites:

Community Law
It’s generally accepted that cats are allowed to wander on to other people’s property and that the owner isn’t responsible for any damage they do.

Citizen’s Advice Bureau / Law Society
Cats are allowed to trespass and their owner is usually not liable for damage the cat does to neighbouring property.

Turner Hopkins Legal - Neighbour Law Part 2
Cats - unlike dogs, cats are not closely regulated, and are allowed to trespass. The cat’s owner is not usually liable for any damage made by their cat.


So I went looking for this law, and initially ran into a heap of dead ends as the references all linked to old MPI documents that have been removed.

So I started with the Animal Welfare Act (1999), which uses Codes of Welfare for each animal group. The one that applies to cats was first produced in 2007, but updated and replaced in 2018. All the dead end links point to the 2007 document, and I can’t find that one now.

https://www.mpi.govt.nz/dmsdocument/...Companion-cats

The Code of Welfare: Companion Cats is the legal framework that links back to the Animal Welfare Act. It’s against this code that any legal issues are judged. I haven’t been able to find anything else legal-like that talks about companion cats.

Failure to meet a minimum standard in this Code may be used as evidence to support a prosecution for an offence under the Act.

Anyway, this code makes no reference to cats being allowed to trespass. It may have stated something along these lines in the previous 2007 version, hence the prevalent view online that cats are allowed to trespass.

The NZ Veterinary Association says in its Responsible Companion Cat Ownership policy (2018):

To avoid companion cats having a negative impact on other people, animals and the environment, an owner should:

• not allow cats to stray from their property
• ensure cats do not predate on vulnerable, native wildlife. Measures to reduce predation include the use of deterrent collars, curfews, confinement and the use of cat aviaries.
• ensure cats do not use neighbours’ yards or gardens for toileting

So has something changed? Did they drop the permissible trespass part? The only part of the current code that talks about cats wandering says:

It is strongly recommended that cats are able to be accurately identified in case of loss, or being held in boarding accommodation. Cats are likely to spend some of their time outside of their owner’s legal property boundary. For the purposes of control, it is necessary to be able to identify whether a cat has an owner or not.

If any of you fellas know something about the legalities that I haven’t been able to find yet, then please post it because I would like to know exactly where we stand regarding the removal of pest cats in rural areas. I am specifically interested in this business of cats being legally allowed to trespass with no owner liability, which I have not been able to identify in either the act or the code.

I recall this article from several years ago, mainly because of the terminology: "mischievous propensity"
https://www.stuff.co.nz/manawatu-sta...ts-and-the-law
Again though no reference back to any particular piece of legislation for this aspect. It seems unlikely with the Author's legal background that some basis didn't exist for making this claim.

Righto, well that’s interesting, I’ve never heard of mansuetae naturae. What I’m detecting @Puffin is that there’s been a shift in attitude towards roaming cats, as there’s been an apparent hardening of attitude since 2018. I wish I could find the 2007 Code to see if there was reference to it in there.

Cats found tresspassing on my farm generally have blue eyes...

One blew over there and the other one blew over there. Thats a 22.250 for ya.

well I know the area VERY well having spent my highschool years across the road from golf course.....residential properties close by...NOT an area I would suggest good place to be shooting cats,at that time the local rubbish dump was located less than km away..basically across the road towards river and maybe 500 yards down road...old cut backs into pumice cliffs gradually getting filled up.
a dead cat is a feral cat......... and if I see feral cat morethan km away from houses and have ability to dispatch it cleanly it becomes a dead cat.

Originally Posted by Flyblown

Righto, well that’s interesting, I’ve never heard of mansuetae naturae. What I’m detecting @Puffin is that there’s been a shift in attitude towards roaming cats, as there’s been an apparent hardening of attitude since 2018. I wish I could find the 2007 Code to see if there was reference to it in there.

Look up page 7 to see if your area have any bylaws @Flyblown ,that might help: chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/viewer.html?pdfurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.publish.csiro .au%2Fpc%2Fpdf%2FPC16022&clen=242157

This one is Welly. Read 3.3, it might been put in there to stop people calling every 5 minutes when a cat walks past a window. https://wellington.govt.nz/your-coun...-animals#four4

Originally Posted by mimms2

Pretty sure Acts as-enacted are available at nzlii.org If you can be bothered searching back.

None of the sites you've linked are legislation. They're all policy, interpretation,

"the law" is avail at legislation.govt.nz

Nope. I started with the Act, which is the high level law as applies to all animals, which in turn references the Codes. The codes are set by the National Animal Welfare Advisory Committee and once issued are held by the MPI. It’s all explained in the Act section 5. Each animal or group of animals get its own code. I linked to the cat code, which says on the front cover “Issued under the Animal Welfare Act 1999”.

The quotes from various entities are relating either to the previous code (2007), or to common law rulings where precedent was created by a judge at some point in time. I suspect the ambiguity of some of the references to trespassing cats (e.g. “generally accepted”) is relating to common law interpretation which is fluid, depending on circumstances. Either way, the NZVC is making its stance clear enough - don’t let your cat wander.

Bottom line is if you shoot someone’s pet cat, and the court believes you knew it was their pet or it should have been obvious it was a pet, you have a case to answer. Which is why the NZVC (and SPCA) make strong statements in their policy about making sure your pet is identifiable as a pet (e.g. collar). Which is what we’ve told our new neighbours - always make sure your cat wears its collar. Not that a collar will save it from a Steve Allan trap.

Yup @Boar Freak, local bylaws are on the list. I can’t get that first link to work though.

Waikato District Council:
Section 5, Keeping of Animals
5.6 Any person keeping an animal shall ensure the animal is confined to the boundaries of the premises where the animal is kept.

That’s pretty clear.

Its from here Google: Research challenges and conservation implications for urban cat management in New Zealand.pdf

As a cat and gun owner that story/video hurts both ways. You better be damn sure it's a feral cat if you're going to shoot it.

What a shit situation. Agree that online mobs are shit too.

Originally Posted by mimms2

Do you "own" it though? Or just feed it and then let it loose to do what carnage it wants?

A bit of both I suppose - the curtains and armchair are buggered. I have two indoor cats. They're ragdolls and are known to be a bit dopey around vehicles, so they are kept inside.

Had several cats and dogs, just like all creatures they all different, temperaments etc.
I've also shot cats out wide in the bush, and dump sights where there numbers had got away and they were suffering, abandoned badly looked after cats left by tenants.
One lasted 23 years, got dragged all over NZ with me and was a real mate, the hunting subsided with age and weight, the fighting part took longer determined bugger, that lasted until the last 5 or 6 years, after several hidings, he gave it away.
Perhaps I'm strange, but I relate and admire a creature, that hunts solo, washes itself and can take its self to the toilet, great pets, easy to keep, not in your face 24/7.
For city folk they are the ideal pet, still need to be cared for, guess that includes humans as well as, like society today (dam things gone wild!)