Peak season for animal shelters

Tuesday, 13 January 2015

It's kitten season and each week brings an influx of furry new faces at the Kitten Inn in Lower Hutt.

Animal shelters around the country are experiencing their busiest time of year, dealing with newborns, strays and animals abandoned during the Christmas holidays.

Susan McNair, who has been inn keeper at the shelter for kittens and pregnant cats for the past 15 years, said the problem seemed to get worse every year.

'We run de-sexing programmes and average out on about 1000 de-sexings a year,' she said.

'But we still find just as many kittens.'

The Inn was currently home to just over 100 kittens - compared to during the winter, when the number usually hovered around 20, McNair said. 

'We're about to hit the second wave. Just over the weekend I took in a mum with eight kittens, then another three, another two, and another five.'

McNair said before Christmas, they ran an open weekend and homed 57 kittens in one day.

But as the months went on, they tended to trickle back in. 'They're no longer that cute little kitten.'

McNair had also received calls over the holiday period of people wanting to know if she would look after their cats while they went away, or claiming they had found a 'stray' which was actually their family pet.

'People don't want to have to pay out, or they can't afford to pay out, so they come in as 'strays'.

'That's the beauty of microchipping - if more cats were microchipped, you would know who they actually belong to.'

SPCA Auckland CEO Christine Kalin said there was always an influx of stray and unwanted animals at this time of year. 

But encouragingly, this year was the first time ever they had not needed to put out a crisis call to try to  find homes for animals.

'Part of that is we have had a good flow of adoptions, and we have the support of a wonderful group of foster families - over 400 - who look after the animals for us until we have room in the shelter to take them back in,' she said.

Shelters would still be under pressure from now until April, so people who were considering getting an animal should do so at this time of year, she said.

Meanwhile in Canterbury, there had been 49 reports of animal neglect between Christmas Eve and January 5, with inspectors picking up 81 animals, SPCA Canterbury CEO Barry Helem said.

The most common reason was people going off on holiday and leaving their animals behind for neighbours to watch.

'We've had animals left tied up, and a few cases of dogs and cats living in cars,' Helem said.

'It just highlights that if you are going to have someone look after your pets, make sure they know what they're doing.'

On Trade Me, there had been a two percent increase in the number of 'free to a good home' listings for cats and dogs, said head of trust and safety Jon Duffy.

Prior to Christmas, the auction website had developed a checklist with the SPCA, the Kennel Club, Cat Fancy and the Veterinary Association to help people make sensible buying choices, he said.

'The idea behind that checklist was to really encourage people to stop and think, and realise that this is a long-term commitment that they're making, and it's not just for Christmas.'