The two chief sources of outdoor mortality are cars and coyotes.
We try to avoid the latter by keeping the cats indoors at night.
The female hangs out around the house, and stays off the roads. The male may be killed by a car, but he was clearly an outdoor kitten before we got him, and he begged to go out from the day he joined us. The first day we let him out (on purpose, when he knew we woudn't try to grab him and put him in) he was ecstatic, rolling and leaping and climbing until he was out of breath, and then going back for more. (Have you ever seen a kitten pant?)
Quality of life counts for something, and this cat is meant to be an outdoor cat.
That the two of them seem to kill rodents is a plus, not the reason they go outdoors.
I think that 2 year figure is fake, or is driven by a lot of kitten mortality.
I've know lots of outdoor cats, and ones who make it beyond a year live nearly as long as indoor cats.
There's a movement to avoid all danger at any cost (see the link to the bee-ban, earlier this week) but danger is a part of life.
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