Entering The House

Today I entered the house Joyce told me about. We have, thankfully, already removed a couple cats, like the first family I wrote about.

I took a camera with me in order to take photos of cats to try to get more adopted out - pictures always help and definitely make the situation more real. It's actually the first suggestion I made to Joyce when she asked how we can start helping the cats - to get names and pictures of their faces out to the public so we could get their help.

I also brought a camera because I really don't think anyone would believe me when we said just how full this house is! If we're to find more help for these cats, the big help that we really need, we've got to take photos to show rescues what these cats are currently living in.

The owners of the home and these cats have obviously been in over their head for some time now and in need of help. Many of the hoarding situations you see in the media result in death for the animals, whether from continuing to live in these conditions or from the local shelter not being able to contain them (be it the huge quantity all at once or the sicknesses hoarded animals often carry). We want something more for these cats - we want to save these cats! All of them.

Thankfully, we're not the only ones with this goal in mind ... we've got some great individuals that want to help too, including the local animal control officers. There's also a low cost spay and neuter clinic that fixed about 25 of the cats so far and great people like Debbie and Kelly willing to foster.

Today, we had a carrier full of kittens waiting for us when we got to the house because a really nice woman, Kelly, offered to foster a group. I hope she can handle 10 because that's what was rounded up! Prepare yourself, Kelly - this crew is all yours now!

A bunch of other cats were surrounding the carrier when we got there (note the first pic) - sniffing it, laying on it, looking into it. There were other cats curled up in carriers we had left there too. There were cats everywhere - on the sofa, on the table, on the kitchen counters, on the kitchen chairs, smooshed in the windows (which were mostly covered over so no one could see in), stretched out on top of a couple refrigerators, etc ... and these are just the cats downstairs. We weren't allowed upstairs.

Here are some photos from the house today:

I was really surprised at how friendly some of the cats were - a lot of them.

However, I told Joyce that the hoarder's house I did almost 10 years ago was a lot like that too - the cats you saw at first were mostly friendly, mostly healthy ... until you started removing them, then the cats would hide or you got down to the cats that were less social.

Well, after leaving the house and waiting for the 10 kittens' foster mom to show up, I noticed one of the kittens had a bump and sore on her little arm. I hadn't noticed it at first until I started looking at the kittens one by one. That'll need to be looked into... and I'm a little nervous about what else we might find in the house if this is how we're starting out. Tweet This