Cats/Kittens From Hoarding Situation

I was talking to our building manager today and she mentioned that there is a lady in our building that has 10 cats. The city limit is 3, so she's way over that, but in addition she cannot properly care for them... we are unsure if they have ever seen a vet, but they are all quite thin and appear otherwise healthy.

Between the building manager and I we can take 5 of the cats, we still need to find foster homes for 2 more and she will be able to legally keep 3 of them.

One of the groups of cats is a mother and her kittens. I'm not entirely sure how many kittens there are but from what she said it sounded like there were 3-4, one had passed at birth. If we can get the ok from animal control I can take the mother and kittens, but if we can't then the mother and one/two kittens will go somewhere else and I will be taking two kittens to care for. Between my boyfriend being out of work right now and my work schedule someone will be home pretty much all the time, we can clean out the dog crate to keep them in if they are really young. The building manager didn't seem to know how old they were - she said their eyes are open and they're moving around, but they are small. Because of legal reasons I cannot find out/know which apartment they are in to ask the lady so I have to go through the building manager for all information. Does anyone have any advice on raising these kittens based on how old they may be (between opening eyes and 8 weeks I'm guessing).

The lady has until December 4th to place the cats/kittens herself. We do not think that she will do it so we will end up taking over. Animal control has been contacted and gave her until that date to place them, then they will go into AC's care. None of us want that... they're a high kill shelter and the cats do not see a vet there. The building manager is trying to get in touch with rescue groups to see if we can get vet care for the cats/kittens if we can find foster homes for them.

Does anyone know of any rescue groups in Southwestern Ontario that would be willing to help in this situation? So far we're just run into "sorry, we're full" or "sorry, we aren't taking any owner surrenders right now".

We may have adoptive homes for two of the cats/kittens already but they can't take them until after Christmas (when we can get transportation to where those homes are).

I dropped some wet food off that I found in our living room while I was cleaning today so that will go to help that cats until they have to be moved.

Thank you for caring about these innocent cats. I hope the potential new homes will definitely be able to take in a few. I wish you and the manager the best. I'm sorry I don't have actual advice

Originally Posted by nerdrock

One of the groups of cats is a mother and her kittens. I'm not entirely sure how many kittens there are but from what she said it sounded like there were 3-4, one had passed at birth. If we can get the ok from animal control I can take the mother and kittens, but if we can't then the mother and one/two kittens will go somewhere else and I will be taking two kittens to care for.....we can clean out the dog crate to keep them in if they are really young. The building manager didn't seem to know how old they were - she said their eyes are open and they're moving around, but they are small. ..... how old they may be (between opening eyes and 8 weeks I'm guessing).

Click to expand...

6-8 weeks kittens dont move around. They climb, they chase, they wrestle, they do gallopp. So about 10-days-3 weeks, max 4.

Good you have this dog crate - such is useful in many situations, esp when you dont have isolation space. Many rescuers dont have any big flats.

Im wondering, though, about mom with fresh litter and the number limits.
As I understand it, the number limit is temporary upheld for them as long as they are on the moms charge...
Otherwise it would be impossible for small breeders. So it is here in Sweden.
I gather it must be with you too- otherwise it would mean a owner of mom cat must kill all kittens save 2...Every time.

You CAN phone the AC and ask to be entirely sure, anonymously if you want.
"Im proposed to take in as rescuee a mom and her 4 kittens. After they are 10 weeks, most of them will of course go to own homes. Is it OK with you?? Im thinking about the 3-limit"

Something like that.


Tx for caring, and good luck!

(tx too to this building manager! whatever you do, keep on her!)

Not sure what she meant by moving around, she could have meant running around and jumping, climbing, etc. I'll have to talk to her more about it, if I see her today I will but she's off duty today so I don't want to bother her.

Our AC is horrible, to put it lightly. You can keep a little until it's 4 months old and then they have to be registered with the city, once they're at that age you cannot have more than 3 cats without having a breeding or boarding license. They will not give breeding or boarding license to anyone that lives in an apartment, no matter what the situation is. It is incredibly hard here to place older cats, kittens are a little easier, but if you are asking for any donation fee that makes it 10x harder because there are so many free ones on Kijiji and in the paper.

When I was working with dog rescue we didn't register the dogs with the city, there was no point because we would usually only have them for a matter of weeks/months and then we would have to register a new dog. One of our members got caught once with having 4 dogs (two were hers, two were fosters), she had to pay a fine, the licensing fee and get one of the dogs moved within a week. Not easy to do when rescue is full. So I worry about that happening with the cats as well, especially since AC has already been notified.

I may have found homes for 1-3 of the cats/kittens just from passing the word around work!

One lady that has a lot of barn cats (and 2 indoor cats) said that if we can get a rescue to pay for the vetting that she may be able to foster one or two of them as well.

I've also emailed a lady that works with some cat rescues in the area that I had heard from when we found a cat about 6-7 months ago, and that I talked to when we adopted Stan. Hopefully I'll hear back from her tomorrow and she can squeeze us in somewhere since we pretty much have the foster care provided - just need the vetting done.

One of the potential homes doesn't care if the cat/kitten is vaccinated as they would prefer to have it done by their vet anyways, so that would lighten the load a little bit... here's hoping everything works out though!

If need be, I know of two local places in SO

http://spca.cambridgeweb.net -Cambridge Humane's society. Great humane society, a no-kill group. My newest addition spent almost a year of her life there. Both of my girls came from there. They tend to have alot of animals because people want them to go there because they know they have a second lease of life. They also adopt furbabies from high-kill shelters and give them another shot here.


http://www.grandriverallbreedrescue.ca -Also I believe is a no kill rescue. I have dropped off supplies to them before. They work mainly in Kitchener-Waterloo, Cambridge and Guelph. But I am sure would help you.



I hope it all works for you though

Edit to say you may have to drop them off there though.

Dropping them off would not be a problem, I could do that.

Haven't heard anything since Thursday... but I didn't get a chance to talk to her on Friday and they are off duty (so won't answer knocks on the door) until Monday. I have to go shopping with my mom for Christmas around noon so I'm hoping that I'll be able to talk to her before that.

If the kittens are young it's really not a good idea to split them up from mom and the rest of their litter. If you could get permission to foster all of them could you do that until the kittens are old enough to leave mom, if they aren't already old enough.

Are the three cats the lady is keeping spayed and neutered or are there any plans to get that done? If not, she will soon be over the limit again.

I really think strict animal limits like that are a bad idea. There should be room for exceptions if it's in the best interest of the animals and there should definitely be exceptions for foster homes. Some areas that do have a limit on amounts of animals you're allowed to have have exceptions for licensed foster homes. You should get some people together and contact local legislators about getting the laws changed for people who do rescue. It can't be in anyone's best interest that the animals go to the shelter instead.

I hope it works out for all the kitties. It sounds pretty promising. Just make sure that you check out the people they are going to to ensure that they are responsible people. If these are just temporary foster homes the cats are going to have to be adopted out to someone else later too. Maybe you've done this before but if not, I wanted to let you know that it's a really good idea to have a clear agreement with the foster homes when it comes to placing the cats in permanent homes. Like who should be responsible for finding new homes, how should the new homes be screened, who should do that, etc. I've learned from experience that you have to have all this worked out beforehand. Years ago when I was new to rescue I placed a cat with a girl to foster and she ended up giving him away to some people she had just met. For all I know they were the type of people that doesn't take their pets to the vet and dump them at the shelter when they're moving. You don't want the cats you've rescued end up in a home like that, maybe having to be rescued again.

Nerdrock, here in the US, nursing kittens are considered part of the mother and not counted until old enough to be taken from the mother at 8 weeks - the legal age. No one would consider separating nursing kittens from a mother just to keep a count down. Once the kittens stop nursing and are old enough to be taken from the mother at 8 weeks of age, then they are counted as individuals. So if they are less then 8 weeks old, and/or are still nursing, they probably won't be counted. They would still be learning social manners and such from their mother if they are under 8 weeks old.

This link has rescues and shelter for Ontario. It's a mixed bag, but you may find some of these helpful.
http://www.canadasguidetodogs.com/onrescue.htm

These are Ontario cat rescue sites. Some may be duplicates from above, but these are just for cats.
https://www.humanesociety.com/cat-re...ntario-rescues

Here's what I have for low cost spay/neuter for Canada.
http://www.spayneuter.ontariospca.ca/

Animal Crusaders of Ontario
Toronto, Ontario
Phone: (416) 438-4636
Email: [email protected]
Referral to low cost vets

If the manager knows if this person has HIV/AIDS, there is a program to help with low cost vet care, pet food and spay/neuter for the cats.
http://www.pwatoronto.org/english/healthPromo.php#pet

The Farley Foundation with help seniors or the disabled on limited incomes with their pets vet care.
http://www.farleyfoundation.org/

For anyone reading along, there is also a Safe Pet Program for women of domestic violence where pets will be fostered in Ontario.
http://www.ovma.org/pet_owners/safepet.html

Hope the links are helpful.
Newt

The issue isn't if the kittens are old enough to be separate or not, I'm willing to take in the entire litter, but we need to have foster homes available for when they hit the 8-12 week mark when they are considered a pet and no longer need their mother. I have to check if it's 8 weeks or 12 weeks old with our AC. At that point I could be fined for having too many pets, no matter if it's a foster or my own pets. We can even be fined for looking after someone else's pet for an extended period of time if it puts us over the limit. The contract with this AC company runs out in 2011 and we're hoping that we can get the contract back with the Humane Society at that point, they're a lot better than the current company and have had the contract before. The current AC probably said they'd do it cheaper than what the Humane Society will, so they got the contract.

I didn't even think about the financial aid for the lady that has the cats, for the ones that she will be keeping. Thanks for posting the links. However, I found when my dog needed to have surgery that if you are not a woman in a shelter, senior citizen or have a job, it's very hard to get that kind of help here. I'm hoping she's a senior because there are more programs then.

As much as I would love to be able to take as many of the cats/kittens as I could and have them spayed/neutered and then adopt them out, we simply can't afford it. There is absolutely no way, so that is why we need to find a rescue that will either let us foster them and pay for their vetting or that will take them. We are just scraping by paying our bills, feeding our own pets and providing vet care for them.

An update - everyone except 2 cats have to go by December 2nd.

The building manager is going to talk to the lady and see if she can get the one mother and the kittens to me - the kittens are less than a week old.

All of the cats are between 3 months and 19 months, with the exception of one male that is 6 years old (the father to everyone else in the apartment).

All are black, some with bits of white, except the 19 month old.

All are litter trained and eating adult food (except the days old kittens), all have claws.

Nerdrock- Check your PMs

Thanks for all the help!

The Humane Society came today while I was out to pick up the kitties as part of their rescue program. They also said that they all should be highly adoptable because of their ages and that they appeared in general good health, apart from being skinny and a sore on the top of the orange guy's head from the 6 year old guy.

The only cat that wasn't picked up was the 6 year old, he went into hiding when they came so they couldn't get him. She is allowed to keep him if she wants to, otherwise, I have a home lined up for him.

She is a senior, I can't remember if I posted that or not when I found out this morning. I have passed along the information for the Farley Foundation and other senior/pet programs for her.

That's great! The Humane Society will have the resources to take care of all the kitties and it takes some burden off you. I'm sure the little kittens will be adopted pretty easily especially since we're out of the kitten season right now.

So the old lady was only allowed to keep one cat and the HS took the rest? How come she couldn't have three?

If the Humane Society there is a cage based shelter maybe you could see about fostering a couple of the older cats that are used to being in a home. Cats that are used to living in a home can get very depressed in a cage day in and day out. Just a thought!

AC was going to allow her to keep two, even though the limit is 3. I'm assuming when the Humane Society came to collect the 8 cats she just told them to take them all. The one cat ran and hid, that's why they weren't able to catch him and bring him. Not sure if she's going to keep him or if she'll give him up as well.

Wonderful news! I'm really glad this all worked out and you've gotten some great resources along the way. Hopefully the lady will get some help as well.

Newt

I just read this story, but I'm so glad to hear it had a happy ending. I'm glad all the kittens were about to be put in new homes.

I'm guessing someone will be keeping an eye on the original owner to ensure she doesn't try to get cute and take in more cats? If someone's a nutty cat hoarder, being told she can't have more cats probably will not deter her; in fact, it might make her more determined to fill in the "void" left open like a traditional hoarder who has their stuff taken away. I hope you won't have to be a frequent flyer to her apartment to re-home her illegally-owned cats.