Climate mess and cleanup costs, feral cats
Heavy rain destroyed the Mill Pond Dam limiting access to Harbor Road in Stony Brook. The nearby Stony Brook Grist Mill also sustained damage. Credit: Newsday/James Carbone
Fuel firms should aid climate cleanup
Sunday’s rainstorm was a reign of terror across Suffolk County [“Sunday storm is a future warning,” Editorial, Aug. 20]. Climate change means there’s no going back to the more predictable weather of times past. Rain is more violent, storms move slower and do more damage, with sea levels rising. This reality is more than we could have imagined.
Yes, we need all the state and federal aid we can get. But government help shouldn’t be the only support we receive. The warming temperatures causing our current and continuing plight are the result of burning oil and gas. The companies that have been doing that should be cleaning up their mess.
— Bridget Nixdorf, Islip Terrace
Spaying feral cats is smart, then feed ’em
I’m guessing the cats that are being fed in the reader’s neighborhood are not fixed [“Feral cats a nuisance in my neighborhood,” Letters, July 30].
Most of the nuisance behaviors that the reader is dealing with are eliminated when the cats are fixed because the spraying, fighting, yowling, etc. are associated with mating. The number of cats will be reduced over time also.
People who feed cats need to reach out to shelters or trappers and get the cats neutered. People shouldn’t become feeder breeders.
— Dara Sullivan, Bellerose
In 1990, I was working for the U.S. Park Police assigned to Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn. I noticed the National Park Service rangers trapping and removing dozens and dozens of feral cats that apparently had been living in the high grass around the government buildings. The rangers said they thought the cats might be eating bird eggs.
Within one month, we were seeing rats, mice and other vermin all around us. The cats were part of the ecosystem. They were slowly allowed to return.
The answer is probably to trap, spay and neuter.
— Bill Stray, Rockaway Park
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