Blame it on AGW: Shelters overwhelmed with cats and kittens

I suspect I'll see enough of this type of article that it's worth launching a series with the title "Blame it on AGW". John Brignell has documented the fact that just about every modern ill is being blamed on global warming; LiveScience brings us another example:

Droves of cats and kittens are swarming into animal shelters nationwide, and global warming is to blame, according to one pet adoption group.

Several shelters operated by a national adoption organization called Pets Across America reported a 30 percent increase in intakes of cats and kittens from 2005 to 2006, and other shelters across the nation have reported similar spikes of stray, owned and feral cats.

The cause of this feline flood is an extended cat breeding season thanks to the world’s warming temperatures, according to the group, which is one of the country’s oldest and largest animal welfare organizations.

“Cats are typically warm-weather, spring-time breeders,” said the group’s president, Kathy Warnick. “However, states that typically experience primarily longer and colder winters are now seeing shorter, warmer winters, leading to year-round breeding.”

We've had maybe a one degree Celsius increase in temperature in the past century, and the majority of that increase happened early in the century. Apparently our feline friends have just now gotten around to noticing that.