Cat casserole plan to save Australia's wildlife

An Australian has come up with a novel solution to the millions of feral cats roaming the Outback: eat them.

Wild cats - the escaped descendants of domestic cats - kill millions of small native animals each year. Now the tables have turned and they find themselves on the menu.

A bush tucker competition held at the weekend in Alice Springs, in the Red Centre of the continent, featured something new: wild cat casserole.



"It's a white meat," said Kay Kessing, who came up with the recipe. "They vary a lot. The first cat I cooked didn't have a strong flavour. I put a lot of ingredients with it and made a beautiful stew. This cat that I've cooked is slightly larger. It has a slightly stronger flavour, but not as strong as rabbit."

Mrs Kessing said she would never dream of cooking a domestic cat. "It should always be wild," she told ABC radio. "And we should be eating donkeys and horse meat, like the French do."

But health authorities in the Northern Territory warned that eating cats could be risky. "It is not illegal to eat feral cat for your own consumption, or your family's," said Xavier Schobben, the director of the health department. But there is no guarantee that any feral animal that hasn't been subject to post-mortem examination is safe."