Ok, I too have been reading things online and I even went to www.kittykind.org looks nice, but I have also read that 200 cats in one year.....come on we all have had sick and elderly cats but 200 in a 12 month time period that is an average of 16.66 a month that means more than half of the month one cat died A DAY...there is something wrong here.
As to taking the other cats out of the home, where would they put them?
There are always alternitives, spay, neuter and medicate, then release into a safe farm land environment....keep the elderly as they have special needs and the too sickly to medicate but otherwise fix me up and if no one can adopt them, they can even be tagged, all my cats have a chip in the neck, if they are lost they can be returned. Then let the kitties be free to roam, farms and farm land can be heaven for a kitty, all those mice and such yummy....
I do not agree with all you say, but then again I am a firm believer in an eye for an eye, and if you do me or my family, furr or child, wrong watch out my wrath is great.
Cherie
"MacKenzie, Kerry N." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
"MacKenzie, Kerry N." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>>>when did we decide that a newspaper version of ANYTHING is accurate
and fair? what sells papers? "woman overwhelmed with departed cats;
living ones in good shape?"<<<<
I know nothing about the case except what I read here on the list, and
as MaryChristine points out you certainly cannot take newspaper articles
as gospel---they're always slanted, it's the nature of the business.
So, I feel unqualified to weigh in, apart from to thank MaryChristine
for a well-balanced and carefully considered reminder of all the factors
that should be taken into account.
Kerry
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of TenHouseCats
Sent: Tuesday, May 24, 2005 2:50 PM
To: FeLVTalk
Subject: KittyKind as a symbol--LONG LONG response!
okay, here goes--this has been in draft form for a number of hours
now..... i know it won't be popular, i just hope that it does make
people stop for a bit and maybe challenge themselves.
while i am not in ny/nj area, and have no personal experience with
KittyKind, i have heard excellent things about this
shelter/group from folks who are
from what i gather, marlene took home the sickly ones--the ones none of
the other rescues would touch. the sick, the elderly, the severely
abused before they reach our care--these cats DIE, with
heart-wrenching regularity. and no one who hasn't accepted the care of
a large number of the most-unfortunate seem to face that reality. and
how many have ever thought about what THEY would do, in the winter, in
the north, with the earthly remains of these finally-free cats?
no one seems to notice that they didn't remove the living cats from
her custody--even if i didn't have a real understanding of how these
things can happen--that would be enough for me to question how
terrible the conditions/her care really were.
38 cats in one room? well, depends on the size of the cats, the size
of the room, the number of litter boxes, the number of windows, the
ventilation, the toys/cat-trees, the number of volunteers who come in
to cuddle and clean. having a roof over their heads, regular food and
water, observant medical care, playtime and affection--to ferals and
stays, this is heaven.
from what i've read from various sources, there were two groups of
cats in the house: 38 were in one group, 10 in the other. to me, that
sounds as if there was intentional segregation done, most likely, for
health reasons (those being treated for uris, need food intake
monitored, chronic diarrhea), ie, the cats' benefit. as someone else
said, including that of too many vets!--even having one FeLV cat in
the house would be construed as mixing the quick and the dead. 38
cats in a 10 x 12 room; not a good idea; 38 cats in a 24 x 30 room?
whole different story. unless you have visited a sanctuary setting
where the cats are free to roam
within their own space, and have plenty of comforts (or, as best
friends puts it re: housing FeLVs, "intellectual
stimulation"--picturing here a full video collection and library!),
most people have no idea of how well the cats get along, and how
well-adjusted they can be.
cremation is VERY expensive if you are talking about 200 cats. when
you're a 501(c)3, you have access to medication and testing kits,
greatly-reduced food costs, and, frequently, vet care at an lower
rate. i'm not sure why her chosing to spend her money on the living
cats is to be faulted so strongly, especially when medical care on a
large scale is far less expensive than when one is doing it on an
individual basis.
did she take on more than she could handle? probably--something i
think we ALL struggle with at one time or another. could she have
asked for help before the authorities got involved? probably. was
putting the bodies outside unburied a good idea--obviously not! none
of this says one word about whether these cats were loved and cared
for when it mattered.
please don't forget that another thing she did was take in the cats
that no one else would.
there was something about her behavior giving the volunteers
permission to do the same thing--if more people WOULD take in the
most-undesirable, then no one single person would ever find themselves
in this situation again.
hopefully what her volunteers, and everyone else when they put
themselves in her place, will learn is to ask for help when it's
needed, to take a hard look at their own limits, and work to find ways
to create the no-kill nation that maddie's fund promotes.
when did we decide that a newspaper version of ANYTHING is accurate
and fair? what sells papers? "woman overwhelmed with departed cats;
living ones in good shape?"
every shelter/sanctuary i know of has freezers full of the left-behind
bodies--it's just something that the general public doesn't think
about, or want to know about. how long they're been there before they
can be buried or otherwise disposed of depends on the available
freezer space, as well as
the method of disposal and, in the case of burial, the weather. it is
NOT unusual in the north to end a winter season with a large number of
bodies. sick cats DIE--i've read nothing that implies that these cats
all died recently, nor in great numbers at any one time.
i have NOT see the video footage, so cannot comment on that. i do know
that animal control would have removed the living cats if there was
cause.
there are also realities about caring for a large number of
"undesirables" that differ from what one would do in their own
home--perfectly clean litterboxes will not be clean in 5 minutes;
there is gonna be loose fur and hairballs and thrown-up meals, and
dumped food and water bowls no matter what. whomever said that cats
are neat animals has never lived with a large number of them at once!
it's a never-ending job, and sometimes medicating and giving the cats
the attention they want comes first.
we do NOT have all the facts here, and the judgmental tone saddens me
deeply. do you think anyone reading these posts, if they were in the
early stages of such a developing situation, would ask for our
help?????? as someone i've been discussing this off-list has said,
this has been an enlightening experience re: attitudes and tolerance
and reality-testing.
am i defending all the choices made here? if all the assumptions being
made ARE true, then of course the behavior is indefensible.
but there is a tremendous amount we can all learn from this--this work
we do is based on love, and sometimes concrete offers of help are
needed. how many of us know our local regulations for the disposal of
the animals in our care? do we actually know what the limit on number
of animals are? do we know if the animal-control authorities in our
area are compassionate and willing to help monitor situations, or
misuse their powers regularly? we need to think about these things,
find the options and solutions before a problem gets out of hand. we
need to make it easier for those who take in the ones that no one else
wants to do so, and together as a community ensure this doesn't happen
anywhere else.
--
MaryChristine
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Have a purrfect day
Cherie
