Wyndham council is planning to take action to reduce the number of feral and unregistered cats it seizes every year.
The council’s draft five-year domestic animal management plan, released earlier this month, said there were 1585 cats impounded in Wyndham during the 2015-16 financial year.
Just 10 per cent of the cats were identifiable by a registration tag or microchip.
In comparison, out of the 978 dogs impounded in the same period, 82 per cent had a tag or microchip.
The council’s draft animal plan also stated that about three quarters of the cats impounded in Wyndham every year were classified as feral, semi feral or “wild with kittens”.
“Semi feral” cats are those which people may feed but do not care for in other ways, such as vaccination and de-sexing.
Although the council already runs programs to educate people about responsible cat ownership, the draft plan proposed introducing new strategies to cut the unregistered cat population.
These included rolling out a “Who’s for cats?” campaign in Wyndham with fact sheets, advertising and promotions to encourage people to take “full ownership” of cats, including discount de-sexing, microchipping and vaccination offers.
Wyndham’s environment and sustainability portfolio holder Cr Heather Marcus said the council hoped this would lead to an increase in cat registrations in coming years.
She said the council last year offered free pet registrations to owners of pets that have not been registered before, until the next renewal period.
“Since we started doing this we have seen an increase of 30 animals per week being registered,” Cr Marcus said.
“We are now looking at extending this offer in the hope that it will continue to produce great results.”
Public consultation on the draft domestic animal management plan will close at 5pm on Wednesday, August 9.
Details: www.wyndham.vic.gov.au/damplan
