A previous attempt to control Marion Island's invasive mice population with cats had dire consequences. Researchers took five cats to the island's meteorological station in 1948, but the offspring of these cats went feral and hunted seabirds as well as mice.

The feral cats bred and spread across the island until they were killing an estimated 455,000 birds a year in the 1970s. Researchers successfully eradicated the cats in 1991.