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Originally, it was thought that cats probably arrived with the First Fleet, since all ships used to have cats to keep the rats under control.

However, it's now thought that cats came before the First Fleet, on the west coast at least, from Dutch shipwrecks, as early explorers saw feral cats in inland Australia only a few years after first settlement.

There is evidence to suggest that domestic cats arrived in Australia long before both the First Fleet or even the Dutch explorers. It would appear that the Macassan traders who sought trepang (sea slugs) off Australia's northern coast some 500 years before the First Fleet had ships' cats, some of which stayed behind in Australia when the ships moved on. Naturally, these cats turned feral once they had to fend for themselves, and with no natural predators in Australia, their population proliferated rather well.

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14y ago

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