While for many the first survival strategy is to flee the urban environment, others may chose differently or be denied the choice by circumstance.

Should urban dwellers contemplating survival be prepared for urban hunting, trapping, fishing, and animal husbandry? If so, what should those preparations look like?

Staying-put makes some sense, for various reasons
1)health care,
2)existing house,tools, vehicles
3)existing friends, neighbors, associates.

Food gathering in an urban environment could be quite a
problem. Rat traps, pigeon traps, dog traps, goose-duck traps
all may be needed. Geese and rats are over-populated now, IMO.

I am not keeping animals now.
Zoning and other laws have eased in recent years so some
cities allow up to 4 chickens (hens only) without a permit.
Rabbits, guinae pigs, pigeons, even goats in some cases are
allowed.

Bees are vulnerable to mysterious die-off and harvesting
honey is a real mess.

Except for bees and pigeons, a big part of the cost is feed.
Reading chicken forums, the guy with a few (or score) birds
will only break-even selling the eggs.
So do you have a big yard to grow feed?

In my opinion it should not look like anything. (be discrete)

However, here is one approach to the problem currently being used.
http://detnews.com/article/20090402/METRO08/904020395/To-urban-hunter--next-meal-is-scampering-by

The biggest argument against urban harvest for me is the pollution levels that might be present in what you harvest. That goes for both plants and animals.
I have known quite a few people who added pigeon, rabbit,squiiel and such to their diets in the cities without any obvious ill effects though.
So I suppose if you are a bit aware of the safe and unsafe areas as far as pollution goes you might be OK.

People are starting to poach larger animals like deer inside cities now too, and of course there are persistent rumours of cats and dogs disappearing just like always.

read Harrison Salisbury's "900 days" about the siege of Leningrad.

Interesting question. I'm going to go out on a limb here. I think that there are quite a few of us on this board that are already avid hunters and fisherman. That in and of itself takes care of a huge part of the preparations. We already have guns, bows, spinning rods (or fly rods ) and so forth. I think that the other part of the equation is the location of the game that you are trying to harvest. Therein lies the problem. If the situation is such that survival is based on the harvesting of game in an urban setting, there will be a LOT of people in the same boat trying to do the same thing. Even though right now we might see large numbers of (blankety, blank) geese blocking the roads, their days would be numbered in the event of some sort of situation where people are trying to survive. There are also legalities involved. I'm thinking: discharging a firearm in city limits, trespassing, hunting out of season, etc.

I guess my opinion is that we shouldn't really prepare for urban harvest, but not completely rule it out if the situation grew that bad. I really think the best option is to make our preparations in such a way that relying on urban harvest of game isn't required.

Agreed, but if those preparations are not adequate for survival?

There are all sorts of pathogenic considerations for harvesting wild/feral animals in an urban environment. Most urban rodents and avian will turn to scavenging fairly routinely, including carrion type scavenging, which has decidedly aversions to consuming any of them.

In desperate times you do what you have to, but I would be all that much more careful handling animals in an urban environment during a crisis condition. Just being close enough to get their cooties on you might be too much.

So, what kind of careful handling should be done?

To reinforce what Ben has stated-

As part of our function, my lab assesses the health status of feral rodents (mainly mice) live trapped in or near our facilities that house or produce laboratory mice. In the past 3 months in excess of 30 live trapped mice from one site have been submitted to us for health evaluation. Here is summary of agents we identified infecting/infesting these mice:

Viral Agents Detected by Serology:
mouse hepatitis virus (MHV)
murine cytomegalovirus (MCMV)
mouse parvovirus (MPV)
lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus (LCMV)*
mouse thymic virus (MTV)
*Known zoonotic agent

Ectoparasites (fur mites):
Myobia musculi
Mycoptes musculinus
Radfordia affinis

Endoparasites:
Syphacia obvelata (mouse pinworm)
Giardia sp.
Spironucleus muris

The main agent of concern from a zoonotic (transmission between human and animal) point of view is the LCMV. So far we have been lucky that the bio-security measures in place have been sufficient in preventing penetration into the facilities proper.
Pete

Wow, those are good enough reasons to buy a few cases of beans, rice, and spam just in case. What, a months worth of food for $20?