Housing Cats at Shelters

The method of housing cats at shelters has an effect on how adoptable the cat is to potential adopters. It also affects the amount of stress suffered by the cat at the shelter. I'd like to summarise the conclusions of three studies into housing at shelters.

Ottway and Hawkins 2003

Cats that did not know each other and who were housed in communal groups were more stressed than cats that were either (1) housed singly or where (2) cats where housed as a group but the cats were familiar with each other.

Durman 1991

When cats are housed in small groups of 4-7 cats in rooms in a shelter, newly introduced cats were stressed and were aggressive towards other cats. After four days of attempts to escape and vocalisations that showed signs of stress, these signs subsided. However, other signs of stress such as sitting underneath shelving changed more slowly. After two weeks an "equilibrium" was reached. After one year cats were more likely to have formed friendships.

Gourkow 2001

Cats kept alone in small stainless steel cages with food, water, litter tray and bedding with visits and handling by a number of different people where "less likely to be adopted" or adopted later than the other cats. The other cats were handled by one or two people only in the same way each time and were housed:

1. as single cats in the same stainless steel cage but it had wooden shelving and an area to hide;
2. in groups of eight cats in a communal cage with hiding places and shelving;
3. as for 2 but with more furniture.

Overall conclusion (mine): new cats at shelters are probably better off being housed singly or in their original group until acclimatized to the new surroundings and then introduced to other groups if there is a space problem at the shelter. The environment should be "enriched" and provide hiding spaces. Being kept apart initial also allows checks on health and behavior etc.

Animal Shelter Conspiracy USA

In the USA I allege that there is a conspiracy to supply cat and dog carcasses to pet food manufacturers which is the reason why the kill rate is so high at no kill animal shelters.

You don't have to look far to find high kill rates, particularly of cats at shelters. They still call then no kill shelters bizarrely. Yesterday I wrote an article about a lack of proper assessment of cat and dog temperament at shelters, referring to the Jackson County Animal Control Shelter where 80% of cats are "euthanised". I know that this is not untypical.

The obvious reason why such a high percentage of cats are killed at shelters in the USA is because there are not enough people willing to adopt unwanted cats.

But that seems simplistic to me and there are enough people. When there is no proper feline temperament profiling and a lack of networking and coordination. I make the argument in this post that there is no need to kill any cats on the grounds of temperament because if the cat's temperament is unsuitable for living with people it must be suitable for living as a feral cat - without people! In which case the cat could be neutered and placed with a feral colony. That is probably not politically correct but it is technically correct.

Some shelters are genuinely no kill - no cats are killed. If they can do why not the rest? There would seem to be only a small number who achieve this perfect score - 100% cats saved.

A shelter has to find an outlet for a cat. If there is no outlet for a living cat, there is an outlet for a dead one: pet food or some other manufacturing process.

It makes financial sense. This possibility is never talked about except by me and it is a highly unpleasant argument. I recall a visitor to my site saying that he had seen lorries taking dead cats for processing so even if there is not a statewide or nationwide conspiracy to kill cats for profit, it does go on somewhere.

When the numbers of killed cats and dogs are as high as they are nationwide (4-10 million?) and when the situation never changes no matter how cogent the arguments are, I have to come to the conclusion that there is a hidden agenda, an underlying reason that is not in the equation that we can see. This hidden agenda is the conspiracy to sell cat carcasses for profit to the manufacturing industry and the first choice is the pet food manufacturers as we know that pet food is made from rendered down dead animals from any source.

Can someone from the animal shelter business come forward and make a comment to tell me that I am writing a load of rubbish?

Cat Shelter Euthanasia Encourages Poor Cat Ownership

About 2.5 million cats are euthanized at cat shelters in the USA yearly¹. Of these 35% are relinquished cats. This is the percentage of cats at cat shelters that are from owners relinquishing their cats². It follows that 875,000 cat companions (pets) are relinquished and killed at cat shelters each year in the USA. I say "killed" because I speculate that these are most often healthy, well adjusted cats and therefore the word, "euthanasia" does not apply. They are just unwanted cats, plain and simple.

In killing them the shelters take away the problem of relinquishment. It is dealt with. It is as if a cat is piece of rubbish to be discarded. Out if sight and out of mind is the motto. In destroying these unwanted cats we make it easier for people to relinquish their cat. We also send out the wrong signal to cat caretakers that a cat's life is not worth that much. This encourages further relinquishment. The mass slaughter - and it has to be called that - also numbs the senses. It has become an accepted routine. I find this astonishing and very sad. This problem should be dealt with before all other issues relating to the domestic cat.

I will further speculate that in the vast majority of cases the reason for relinquishing the cat is unjustified or the arguments for it are weak. People can always find a reason for doing something but is the reason soundly argued? In killing relinquished cats shelters are indirectly endorsing and supporting the process of relinquishment. This is not done deliberately but it is happening. Also cat shelters are undermining their objective as "shelters" and almost exclusively reacting to the problem.

Shelters do a lot of good, sometimes great work, of course they do, but I think it is time to change the way they work. Funding should be redirected from clearing up the mess to preventing the mess occurring. I'll let people with imagination and drive work out how to take proactive steps to curb the killing.

---

Note:
(1) Estimated from Social Compassion in Legislation, 2009 figures
(2) National Council on Pet Population, 2009

The Disposable Cat Companion

The most important topic concerning the domestic cat today is the killing of up to ten million or more - we don't know how many - domestic, stray and feral cats and dogs in the USA every year. It has to be the most important subject because the life of a cat is the most important thing about a cat or any living creature.


Photo by daveparker (Flickr)

I'll make one thing clear from the outset, this situation is not confined to the USA. I choose to refer to the USA because it is the biggest domestic cat market and I know it. There is no other reason. I am not being judgemental of Americans. I am simply trying to help to resolve a problem that has become tolerated.



The mass killing, commonly erroneously referred to as "euthanizing", is due to the overpopulation of cats. There are not enough people who want to be a guardian to a domestic cat. A lot of surplus domestic cats are killed at shelters.

It is accepted that the overpopulation is due to a segment of society who are not responsible enough in respect of cat caretaking. Some people allow cats to breed, then wander and some dispose of cats as they would a item of clothing that they have grown tired of. It is an attitude problem.

There has been a stable cycle of oversupply of domestic cats and killing of domestic cats for decades. Unhappily, it is a settled arrangement. Why is this?

One major factor is the policies of most animal protection organisations including the mighty HSUS that the euthanasia of animals is the best way to deal with animals in "physical distress". This is the stated policy of HSUS on their website. The concept of ending suffering by killing is confirmed by Miyun Park a former vice president at HSUS in a video on YouTube. We also read on the internet the way this policy is carried out - stories of high percentages of euthanasia at HSUS shelters.

I would argue that this is a misguided policy in respect of long term goals. The long term objective of HSUS and cat welfare organizations must be to end the cycle of cat breeding and cat killing as this is in the best interests of animal welfare. The mass euthanasia of distressed cats leads to the mass killing of unwanted cats and this provides a steady outlet for the oversupply problem. Mass killings supports careless cat caretaking as it allows people to be careless in their cat guardianship. It takes away the urgent need to deal with the root cause of the problem; irresponsible management of domestic cats by cat "owners".

If there were no killing of cats, in a very short time there would be a huge problem of unwanted cats on the streets, which would force the authorities to take steps that would genuinely resolve the domestic cat overpopulation problem.

The misguided policy of killing to remove the problem is fatally compounded by the fact, yes fact, that dead cats are a commercial resource that are turned into profit through the process of animal carcass rendering. The rendering of dead animals converts the carcass into a material that can be used to manufacture a salable consumer product.

The County of Los Angeles Department of Animal Care and Control runs six animal shelters. The director as at 2008, Marcia Mayeda, states in a letter dated 21st August 2008 that her department contracts with a large company, D&D Disposal Inc. to remove and render almost 100,000 dead animals from the shelters each year. A subsidiary of D&D is employed to render the dead cats and dogs (West Coast Rendering). This has taken place for 25+ years, the letter says. Many local animal care agencies in California use the same company (strange use of the word, "care" isn't it).



The very important point that I wish to make is that animal shelters that contract with commercial enterprises for the removal of dead animals have created a conflict of interest that seriously undermines their primary objective of saving the lives of companion animals.

If the shelters sell the carcasses to D&D the situation is even more serious as it would help sustain the shelter and the killing of cats and dogs. The cycle of careless cat guardianship - breeding cats - feckless relinquishment of cats - killing of cats is thus perpetuated. The commercial aspect of the arrangement makes the mass killing of cats across the USA tolerable as it allows it to fit into the consumer society. The whole process has been rejigged to become tolerable.

I am not saying that this conflict of interest is the sole and major cause of this unhappy situation. It is just one more compounding factor. One more brick in the wall. It needs to be dislodged, removed.

When a person goes to see a doctor because he or she is in distress the first objective is the welfare of the person not the killing of that person. Only under the most serious of conditions is the death of the person considered the best option and nearly always that is illegal. The same should apply to our companion animals. I say this not only for the animals but for ourselves as it would in the longterm help to resolve the oversupply of cats problem.



From The Disposable Companion to Home Page

Potential conflict of interest at animal rescue and shelter organisations

The objective of animal rescue and shelter organisations is to rescue cats. The objective of cat shelters is to shelter cats, to help and conserve. Killing cats at these shelters is the opposite to rescue.

Granted that sometimes there is simply no choice so cats have to be killed. But if there is a motivator in the background that takes the edge away from trying as hard as possible to save and re-home a cat, then there is a potential conflict of interest.

By a motivator I mean an agreement with someone or some organisation that might provide financial benefits to the shelter and under which the shelter is to provide dead animals.

Dead animals are resource. They have a value. That is obvious. In fact I would find it odd if animal rescue centers did not sell dead animals to someone because that will help fund the rescue center.

My thoughts are prompted by a story in the Times newspaper today which uncovers what I would describe as dubious practice at the Battersea Dogs & Cats Home. Apparently they have provided dead dogs to a research unit at the Royal Veterinary College who have carried out tests relating to respiratory disease on the dog's bodies. The dogs were dissected.

There is no evidence to suggest that the dogs were put down other than for the usual reasons - characters unsuitable for re-homing. That said who and under what criteria are dogs assessed for character? How scientific is the assessment?

If there is even the slightest of motivators to put the dog down over an attempt to re-home and assess the dog objectively, there must be a conflict of interest.

A conflict of interest is a serious matter as it goes to the heart of the operation of saving and re-homing animals.

The practice should stop immediately.



From Potential conflict of interest at animal rescue and shelter organisations to Home Page

Feline Euthanasia

 Bob on the day he was euthanised. Photo Maggie Osterberg (Flickr). This page in his memory.

There are two things about feline euthanasia that are worth knowing (a) how it is done today and (b) when to do it. The latter is the most difficult subject.

It is interesting to note that in probably the best book on cat health, Cat Owner's Home Veterinary Handbook, a truly excellent book that I heartily recommend, there are only 10 lines on the subject of feline euthanasia (note: the latest edition has more!). The book has 419 pages.

This is because there is not much to say about it, if we are honest. There comes a time when your cat will either die naturally and hopefully painlessly at home, or a decision will have to be made to put him or her to sleep. At this point it is worth reminding ourselves what the word "euthanasia" means. It is said that cats are euthanised at cat shelters but this is frequently untrue. They are killed, plain and simple. See also Euthanasia of Feral Cats.

Euthanasia means, "..the practice of ending a life in a manner which relieves pain and suffering..". In other words the tough decision is made between veterinarian and cat caretaker to end a cat's life because it is the humane and kind thing to do. The classic situation will be when the cat suffers from a painful and progressive terminal illness and there is no chance of improvement and where the cat is suffering.

Clearly the veterinarian will be called upon to give best advice. He or she takes the responsibility whether to euthanise or not. It must be a difficult assessment as cats hide pain and you can't ask a cat how they feel etc.

These days, at veterinarians, euthanasia is carried out "by an intravenous injection of an anesthetic agent in sufficient amount to cause immediate loss of consciousness and cardiac arrest". I have quoted the above book for absolute accuracy.

In some shelters other forms of so called euthanasia is sometimes employed probably for financial reasons. It is not cheap to kill a cat. Carbon dioxide or carbon monoxide has been used but this causes distress. This post talks about this unsettling subject in more detail, describing the various methods old and modern: Euthanise a cat.

Feline Euthanasia -- Associated pages:

The Argument for Euthanizing Feral Cats

Humanely Euthanize A Cat

Killing Cats



From Feline Euthanasia to Home Page

Tabby and white cat in the best cat sanctuary

This is Neena at a private cat sanctuary at Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil. This is an extraordinary cat sanctuary. It is private so I presume that they are funded by donations although I sense that in this case that might not be the way it is funded. It is not a cat shelter in the classic sense (i.e. cats rescued and rehomed) but a true sanctuary where cats that are rescued can call it their home. It is instant re-homing!

That said the cats are available for adoption but apparently the sanctuary owners don't allow most of the cats to go to new homes (perhaps the offers from prospective owners are not good enough, which wouldn't surprise me as the sanctuary seems to be better than most homes!) "Super premium" cat food is served and medical care is available twice weekly. Forget the private cat keepers of Brazil, forget the USA or anywhere elese, this is the best cat home in the world. There are a staff of 4 and about 300 cats as far as I remember.

And what about this fine photograph and beautiful cat? Well, firstly it is by Giane Portal, who lives in San Paolo, Brazil and she is the best amateur cat photographer anywhere I think. She is also involved in cat rescue.

For me, the impact from this photograph comes from the fact that it seems that this beautiful cat is lying in the road, against the curb!  This is not true as it was taken in the sanctuary but this impression creates a tension and a contrast between the soft beauty of the cat and the cold danger of the concrete road. I sense that Neena is very vulnerable yet she is completely safe and in good hands. Well, that is how I analyse it.

This cat is a long haired cat or medium long haired and Neena has a tabby and white coat. You can see the classic tabby "M" mark on the forehead. Neena is a random bred cat.

By the way, Giaine Portal, uses the Flickr name, fofurasfelinas. You can click on the photo to go to the original one on Flickr and see some more of her work. This photo is part of the cat-photo-technique Flickr group.



From Tabby and white cat in the best cat sanctuary to Home Page

How to Kill Cats Humanely or Not

In an early post I explained with a heavy heart and an angry brain how to kill cats humanely or not. Please read it here if you like: Euthanize a cat. It is interesting and disturbing. In that post I said that PETA considered that euthanasia by carbon dioxide poisoning to be cruel as the cat struggles for air and screams. The point of this post is this. When a cat shelter uses the carbon dioxide method of killing cats it is easier for the people doing the killing and harder for the cat.

This is because the cat is put into a chamber and the person in charge leaves the room. When it is all over they come back and do what they do with a dead cat - what do they do with dead cats? It is said some go into cat food.....!

OK the SPCA (Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) animal shelters in Nova Scotia have been directed to use lethal injections as it has been decided that it is more humane, which it clearly is. Well done. But this new procedure is proving hard to do by the volunteers and staff of the shelters because the cat has to be held by the person when the injection is being delivered. There is an interesting natural balance here in terms of pain. For the cat there is less pain and for the people there is more pain. This may lead to less killing of cats in shelters, in fact. Cape Breton SPCA killed more than 1,000 cats in 2008.

It also brings to mind one of the root causes of the gradual eradication in the wild of wildcats. For 99.99% of the world's population the beautiful wildcats are out of sight and out of mind. We don't see the deaths of tigers by poisoning. We don't see a leopard being beaten to death by irate villagers who are forced to live in close proximity to leopards and tigers. If we did perhaps something better would be done about it.



From How to Kill Cats Humanely or Not to Feral Cats

Cats as a disposable item

Is it right that during this time of financial difficulty for some people, that they should treat cats as a disposable item?

It seems that the abandonment of domestic cats is on the increase in the United States. The Shelby County Humane Society has taken in a significantly larger number of abandoned and stray animals this year compared to 2007. This is despite the fact the county has a high proportion of educated people.

Cats that are handed in to the The Shelby County Humane Society facility are most likely to be euthanized as there is no chance of the owners turning up to recover a lost cat. The rescue center must be turning into a kind of processing plant as a large number of cats must be euthanized as they are full.

The situation seems hopeless. It seems that some (perhaps a significant number judging by the increase in abandoned cats) people do treat cats as a disposable item in the same way that they would throw away a old washing machine. It is understandable but we cannot it seems to me treat a living creature like an inert machine. We have to find a better way surely.

If the people can find somewhere to live isn't it possible to keep there cats? If a house is repossessed don't the local authorities help with rehousing in some way? And if the rehoming precludes a cat why should this be the case?

It seems to me that we have a responsibility to our domestic cats that we cannot walk away from and a little more effort and commitment may save many cat's lives. Am I being too harsh?

Cats as a disposable item to Home page

No kill cat shelters

Photo by SHamEy jo. Did he survive?

No kill cat shelters do in fact, very often, kill cats, at least, indirectly. If a cat shelter is not one of the "No kill cat shelters" it has to be a cat shelter that openly kills cats in which case it cannot be described properly as a cat shelter. In fact the description "no kill" is probably misleading and so is the description "shelter". It really is not as it seems as far as I can tell.

{note: these are my considered thoughts. I am thinking aloud really and, yes, they are provocative thoughts. They are not the views of anyone else that I know off. They are also views meant to play devils advocate, meaning to raise uncomfortable questions. I think that it is important to do this. It is not enough for a website to duplicate and regurgitate what is already on the internet. It is better to push the boundaries a bit and try and improve things if that is possible. Cat shelters generally provide a fine service and I have a lot of admiration for them but what is happening?}

The only true cat shelters are no kill cat shelters that kill no cats at all and I am not sure that they exist (wrong? please tell me in a comment - see below). Cat shelters that conduct a program of euthanasia (or just plain killing - there is a difference, read this) should be called by some other name such as "cat processing plant", "cat re-homing and re-cycling plant". I know this sounds callous and maybe odd but what happens to the bodies of 2 million plus cats that are euthanized in cat shelters throughout the USA? This is a critical but I hope fair look at no kill cat shelters.

I cannot believe that cats are cremated after being killed as body parts are a valuable commodity in the world of commerce and a cats anatomy is similar to ours. It is why they are used in animal testing and why their bodies will normally be re-cycled into something humankind can use (i.e. in a consumer product). I say that this might be one reason why the feral cat population is not being dealt with as vigorously as it should be. In other words there is a certain amount of background commercial pressure to not eliminate feral cats and abandoned cats. Lets see if we can find something on the internet on the subject of euthanized cats before I talk about no kill cat shelters.

My research tells me the following:

----The San Francisco Chronicle reported on a story about a cat they called Phoenix (as he rose from the dead). He was injected with pentobarbital sodium and/or phenytoin sodium. These are standard euthanasia drugs. Euthanasia means being killed painlessly. Not all "kill shelters" use this drug. Some just kill. Anyway he was put into a dumpster with 19 other cats and when the dead cats were being transferred to a "City Disposition" truck it was found that he was breathing. He was successfully recovered and re-homed through Pets Unlimited. The point is this, City Disposition is a local government department (I presume) that reprocesses cat bodies and/or sells or gives them to companies that use the parts in products such as shampoo and soap. So, there is some proof. The journalist was interviewing a Pets Unlimited worker who gets involved with other shelters. The evidence is pretty sound, therefore.
(source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/gate/archive/2003/08/25/urbananimal.DTL)

----In another source a truck driver's wife/partner disclosed that her husband took cats and dogs to cat food plants for rendering. (source:http://www.petcaretips.net/euthanized_pets_in_food.html). So when we feed cat food to our cats they are eating another cat on the basis of this evidence.

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Photo by SHamEy jo. Did he survive?

I am not going to bother to search more because it is actually obvious that cats killed at cat shelters (other than no kill cat shelters ) are selling or giving away (I'd be surprised if they weren't sold) their dead cats. So the next question is, are the shelters funded by the sale of the dead cats and is this legal? A lot of the cats will belong to someone. Can a shelter kill and sell the cat without permission? Probably yes if a certain time has elapsed.

Turning to no kill cat shelters. They obviously do great work but how do they cope with all the cats that come their way. If cat shelters that kill cats have to kill cats, as there is not enough room to house them, how do the "no kill cat shelters" deal with the numbers? Do they refuse to shelter some cats? Or, do they select the cats that they consider adoptable and pass on the others to kill shelters? I favor the second option. If I am correct then some no kill cat shelters are not exactly what they say they are. But this still makes them better than the ones that kill more freely it seems to me. Perhaps not.

Of course a third option is that they get just the right amount if feral and abandoned cats for re-homing. In other words the input exactly matches the output. Does that seem likely to you? No obviously not.

I have decided that in no kill cat shelters the people who work there will have to put down some cats (euthanize some cats) or pass them on to a "Processing plant" for euthanasia and body part recycle. The selection will have to be made on illness, the mentality and age of the cat, I guess. Kittens come first it would seem. A cat selected for euthanasia is probably too aggressive or ill. But it seems some cats that have treatable illnesses are still killed. And who made the cat aggressive? Probably a nasty human who mistreated the cat over a period of time or it is due to illness. Cats are not inherently aggressive.

On a more optimistic note, it seems, is that the concept of "no kill" with all its flaws may have had a positive impact on the numbers of cats killed each year in "shelters". One problem is getting good and accurate reporting from the cat shelters. We don't really know how many cats are killed but a good estimate is over 2 million currently (in the USA, the biggest domestic cat market). This is a vast number. A similar number of dogs are also deliberately killed.

The truth is the supply of abandoned cats has to dry up as the no kill cat shelters simply treat the symptoms. I would have thought more resources would have been put into slowing supply. But there again maybe big business is having an indirect say in that.

Photos: Both are published under a Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License

Sources other than stated in the text:

• http://www.bestfriends.org/archives/forums/nokill.html#thirteen

No kill cat shelters to Home page