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Beneath its adorable exterior, is your cat hiding the heart of a killer? Researchers now estimate that each year, domestic cats kill billions of birds and mammals in the United States alone. The report is in Nature Communications.
在你家貓咪可愛的外表下隱藏著一顆殺手之心嗎？據研究人員估計，每年被家貓殺死的鳥類和哺乳動物僅在美國就多達數十億。該報道發表在《自然通訊》雜志上。
We already knew that domestic cats can wreak havoc on islands, causing 14 percent of species extinctions and ranking as one of the world's 100 worst invasive species. But now, scientists have reviewed previous studies to find just how much damage cats do on the mainland.
眾所周知，家貓能大肆破壞小島，導致14%的物種滅絕，這使家貓成為世界上最麻煩的入侵物種之一。但是現在為了弄清楚家貓在大陸會造成多大的破壞，科學家們檢查了以往的研究。
Cats kill some 1.4 to 3.7 billion birds and 6.9 to 20.7 billion small mammals in the U.S. each year. These numbers mean that felines may be the biggest human-related cause of death for American birds and mammals. And cats tend to prey on native species, which can cause major ecosystem damage.
在美國，家貓每年會殺死大約14—37億只鳥類，以及69—207億只小型哺乳動物。這些數據意味著貓科動物是造成美國鳥類和哺乳動物死亡的最大的人為因素。且家貓傾向于捕獵當地的物種，這嚴重損壞了生態系統。
The worst feline killers are those without owners, and reducing feral cat populations is an ongoing problem. But you can still reduce the impact of domestic cats by keeping your pet indoors, thus leaving the neighborhood a little less red in tooth and claw.
最有害的貓科動物殺手是那些流浪貓，減少流浪貓的數量是一個持續存在的問題。不過，你仍可以通過將寵物關在室內來減輕破壞，這樣就能讓社區少一點血腥。
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