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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.
在你家猫咪可爱的外表下隐藏着一颗杀手之心吗？据研究人员估计，每年被家猫杀死的鸟类和哺乳动物仅在美国就多达数十亿。该报道发表在《自然通讯》杂志上。
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.
众所周知，家猫能大肆破坏小岛，导致14%的物种灭绝，这使家猫成为世界上最麻烦的入侵物种之一。但是现在为了弄清楚家猫在大陆会造成多大的破坏，科学家们检查了以往的研究。
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.
在美国，家猫每年会杀死大约14—37亿只鸟类，以及69—207亿只小型哺乳动物。这些数据意味着猫科动物是造成美国鸟类和哺乳动物死亡的最大的人为因素。且家猫倾向于捕猎当地的物种，这严重损坏了生态系统。
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.
最有害的猫科动物杀手是那些流浪猫，减少流浪猫的数量是一个持续存在的问题。不过，你仍可以通过将宠物关在室内来减轻破坏，这样就能让社区少一点血腥。
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