Katherine Moseby wants to be clear: she does not hate cats. “They’re a wily beast,” she says, as her truck rumbles down a desert road. “But I respect them. They’re pretty incredible animals. Amazing hunters. Very smart.”

That is precisely the problem, says Moseby, the principal scientist and co-founder of Arid Recovery, a conservation nonprofit and wildlife reserve in South Australia. Cats are not native to Australia, but they have invaded nearly every corner of the country. She gestures out of the window at the dusty, red expanse, which bears few signs of life. But feral cats are absolutely out there, Moseby says, and they have a taste for the tiny, threatened marsupials that live at Arid Recovery.