Almost everywhere we went in southern Italy, cats were abundantly evident.
Generally, they roamed freely, and were neither belled nor tagged.
Their state of health was hugely variable; it was often impossible to know whether an individual was a “feral” or (notionally, at least) a “domestic” cat.
I suspect that the above circumstances have more than a bit to do with another surprise, at least to us: that birds are usually strikingly less evident/abundant/diverse on southern Italian streets than on West Australian ones.
Photo is copyright Doug Spencer, taken at 3.10 pm on 07 September 2023, in a celebrated, very “touristy” garden in Ravello.
As lovers of untamed places, we were less entranced by the garden than were most other tourists that day…. but it is hard to imagine a visitor whose jaw would fail to drop when s/he sees the view, looking down to the actual Amalfi Coast.