What is Po' Kitties?

This past July the Foothills Humane Society Board agreed to start a program to help the feral cats in our community. The cat overpopulation problem is not going to go away on its own and by last estimate there are now almost as many stray feral cats as there are cats in homes. This number is estimated to be over 70 million cats with no home! Feral cats are, by definition, those cats that cannot be tamed or adopted out. We will be kicking off our new program, Po'Kitties, on October 16th, which is National Feral Cat Day.

Until now, feral cats have been brought to the shelter by animal control and euthanized immediately. Many folks try to place blame on the shelters but what are they supposed to do with feral cats??? These cats are not adoptable and because of people who have abandoned them and not spayed or neutered their cats, many have reverted to being feral, and then they have kittens and the cycle repeats itself. Now, these same feral cats will, most times, have the chance to live out their lives in freedom. Where landowners agree, the cats will be trapped, sterilized, vaccinated, and released to live out their days. They will be under the care of either the landlord who agrees to take care of them or a volunteer who agrees to caretake them. Cats that have been sterilized as part of this program will be eartipped so they can be identified as having been spayed or neutered at a glance. This project will reduce the euthanasia rate of cats in the shelter, save money now being spent rounding them up, and work to reduce the numbers of the cat population over time and SAVE LIVES!!.

For this to work and be successful, it is going to take some time and a change in the attitude of the community concerning cats. Cats that are sterilized and disease free rarely cause the problems that unsterilized cats cause.

So...how can you help?

1) By helping to spread the word that cats deserve better...it is not their fault that they are abandoned and left unsterilized, to have litter upon litter and become nuisances. Many of these nuisance behaviors no longer exist once they are spayed or neutered.
We really need the cat lovers to step forward and support this program and help spread the word!

2) By helping us identify some of the colonies in the Polk County and Landrum areas...
if you know of colonies already being taken care of, please let us know..also, are these cats sterilized or just being fed and having more kitties?

3) Do you have a barn or safe place that you might be willing to allow a few TNR cats to be placed...we would prefer to place them back at the original place, but sometimes these places might not be safe for the cats.....

4) We can use donations to get our TNR fund going to help pay for the sterilization of these cats.....the check would need to be made out to Foothills and be designated for the "PO' Kitties" Fund.

5) And we can always use folks willing to help caretake a colony or help with trapping if that should appeal to anyone out there.

Cats, in general, have not been treated very kindly and we are excited that this will be the start of a kinder, more humane existence for the cats in our area.

We will have a booth with more info and our new Po Kitties t-shirts for sale at the Any and All Dog Show October 14th at Harmon Field.

Please help us help them!

If you would like more info on this project and are being a kind person and feeding feral cats and kitties, please contact us so we can help you with getting them spayed or neutered!!!

Please contact one of these people for more info!

Elaine Rizzo
Email me!

Dana Mayer
Email me!