Fears are rising that stray cats are being deliberately poisoned on Japan’s famed “cat island” after an unusually sharp decline in the feline population.
The number of cats on the remote Umashima island, some six miles from the southern city of Kitakyushu, has mysteriously fallen from 90 in 2014 to around 30 this year.
The cause of their disappearance is unknown but eyewitness reports pointed to suspicious-looking food that was left out for the animals, including cuts of fish laced with a blue-coloured substance, reported the Mainichi Shimbun.
In October 2018 and in May 2019, fish covered with what appeared to be a pharmaceutical product was found scattered in multiple locations on the island, reported the paper.
It said that formerly healthy cats had been spotted foaming at the mouth and collapsing. In September 2017, five cats were discovered dead or dying at the same time within a 30-metre radius near the harbour.
Reuters
The cats have become a tourist draw to the sparsely populated island in recent years but in 2014, 79 out of 90 of the animals were neutered after complaints about the smell and nuisance of the growing population.
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However, Kunihisa Sagami, director of Doubutukikin, the foundation which carried out the neutering process, expressed alarm about the sudden drop in numbers. "It’s not a normal decrease, and there’s no doubt that an outside, human element, such as animal cruelty, is causing it,” he told the Mainichi.
Masami Takeshita, head of the cat protection group Taisetsuna Nekotachi said the laced food could be used as evidence to file a criminal complaint based on the Animal Welfare act.
“I want to protect these little lives that are cherished by the community in any way I can,” she said.