Kitten thrown from car outside the home of the person who adopted him

Sometimes there can be a domestic cat merry-go-round. It happens all over the place in all developed countries to varying extents. I read about them a lot. One person throws a kitten away. Another person picks him up and lives with him the rest of his life. Sometimes that process is extended whereby the second owner also gives up the kitten or adult cat to a rescue. They adopt the cat out. The adopter might also relinquish their cat. It can be a merry-go-round.

Gray - a cat who was thrown away from a car as a kitten and adopted by the owner of the house near to where it happened. Photo: Janet Johson.

There is a good and rather stark example on the Internet. It comes from Janet Johnson. It happened last January when her son looked out of their front window at 8:15 PM. They live in South Carolina and the temperature was forecast to drop to 28°F. A cold night.

Johnson's son turned to her mother and said that somebody just threw something out of the car in front of their house. She went to the front door to have a look as the non-descript car pulled away.

Walking down the driveway was a little grey kitten about 4-5 months old. Johnson was not in the mood to adopt a kitten but she had lost a Maine Coon that she had adopted in 2011. He disappeared mysteriously the year before last. Perhaps he is another victim of the merry-go-round? Stolen and sold?

Johnson rescued and adopted the little grey kitten and called him Gray. She said that he is healthy, happy, neutered, loved and aggravating at 5 AM. The casualness with which the people in that non-descript car threw away their kitten is shocking. It was right in front of Johnson's house for anyone to see.

Throwing out kittens is a bit like fly tipping in the UK when people throw away items by the roadside along country lanes. They do this because it's easier to do rather than taking it down to the council tip. It's laziness. In respect of kittens it is callousness. The mentality of people who do this is very poor. They could take the kitten to a rescue centre. Too messy and too much trouble. Too embarrassing as the reason is probably allowing cats to breed.

But there is a merry-go-round between the bad people and the good people as illustrated. However, sometimes it's just about mediocre people who adopt and give up and then somebody else adopts and they give up and so it goes on.

This practice happened a lot during Covid lockdowns in the UK regarding dogs, actually. Casual and self-indulgent adoptions of puppies led to early relinquishments when they realised dog ownership is not a pushover, which led to advertising their dog for sale on social media (against the rules on Facebook) which in turn led to more careless adoptions and so on. The victims are the companion animals who are shunted around between different owners.