I got an email from a contact at Disney requesting help for an older gentleman who was feeding some cats outside his apartment. Cat populations can quickly multiply with one female having up to three litters a year. Those kittens are ready to have kittens of their own in less than a year as well. What had started out as one cat was now at six and he was feeling a bit overwhelmed.
We have an EXCELLENT program here in Los Angeles called Fixnation. What's so great about Fixnation, you ask?
They spay/neuter, deflea, provide shots for FREE to ferals. They will train you to use their traps, set you up and appointment and hold your hand through the process. They are, in a word, WONDERFUL. I had worked with them years ago with a feral colony in Studio City. The apartment building that I lived in bordered on two restaurants so we were crawling with cats when I moved in. We started with 37. Eight years later when I moved out, we were down to 3. Yes, I said 3. Thanks to Fixnation, I was able to trap, spay/neuter, deflea, treat infections and give these cats a much better quality of life until they passed on.
Tonight, my husband and I spent an hour trapping for Oscar. In an hour, we had four of the six cats. They are spending the night warm in my bathroom tonight, will be fixed tomorrow and rereleased on Tuesday. Oscar will continue to feed them and they will healthier, better quality lives all because he cared enough to feed them and reach out for help.
So next time you think, what can ONE person do? Remember that YOU can do a lot. You can change the life of an animal, make it better, just by caring enough to give a few hours of your time.
