The National Park Service has drawn howls of protests for its plan to remove hundreds of stray cats from the San Juan National Historic Site. The popular tourist area is in Old San Juan, Puerto Rico. The Service says the cats can be vectors of diseases transmissible to humans. It has given the felines a six-month eviction notice.
Stray cats get six-month eviction notice
An estimated 200 cats live on the 75-acre fortress site. The Park Service says it will issue a contract to an animal welfare organization. That group will have six months to clear out the critters. At the end of the six-month stint, any cats that haven’t been vamoosed will face a new contract. One with a “removal agency.” The agency’s cat-cleanout plan says, “All visitors will benefit from the removal of a potential disease vector from the park.”
While the stray cats have become a focal point of photos at the site, the Park Service notes not all visitors are feline-fixated. “Encounters between visitors and cats and the smell of urine and feces are … inconsistent with the cultural landscape,” notes the NPS.
Where did they come from?
Some of the cats are thought to have descended from cats of the colonial era. Another theory suggests they were brought to the capital to kill rats in the mid-20th century. That was said to be done by legendary San Juan Mayor Felisa Rincón de Gautier. Regardless of their origin, the Park Service wants the stray cats gone. When the agency held a hearing as part of the proposed plan, it gave two options: Remove the cats or keep the status quo. Attendees rejected the “eviction” plan, citing how desirable it was to keep them there. No matter, the cats will go.
According to a story on Fox News: “The six-month timetable to remove the cats is unrealistic, said Ana María Salicrup, secretary of the board of directors for the nonprofit group Save a Gato, which currently helps care for the cats and which hopes to be chosen to implement the plan. ‘Anyone who has worked with cats knows that is impossible,’ Salicrup said. ‘They are setting us up for failure.’”
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Is there enough other wildlife to sustain the cats? That is, mice, frogs, and whatever else they tend to eat? I guess not if there is an organization that feeds them. That must be a large place to provide a habitat for ~200 cats. Well, can’t drive the RV there, so I doubt that I’ll see the cats, or where the cats were.