Pets Animal shelter resources are not enough to save all abandoned cats – animal abandonment has increased during a pandemic

Old the small rooms of the detached house have been converted into a cat care room. In one room are five young felines who watch the newcomers relentlessly. You can’t go to their cage, because the five have lived their lives in the woods and are still alienating people.

The Sagitta cat, on the other hand, skates in another cage behind its small nest. Only its wedge eyes are visible from the small gap. The timid cat will be able to reach a new home in a few weeks.

“Its new owner has been here a few times already to get Sagitta used to him,” the animal house manager in charge of the Cat House Heli Tanskanen Tesy tells about the Turku Animal Welfare Association.

All discovery cats, except puppies, are given a name in the Cat House. This year, the names are given according to the stars and constellations. Sagitta is the small constellation of Arrow in the northern sky.

Cat house cats are in a lucky position, although some animals are abandoned or abandoned pets and some have lived their lives in the wild.

More than 20,000 cats are abandoned in Finland every year. The number is so large that the resources of animal shelters and animal shelters are insufficient.

Some animals found in the wild have to be killed due to disease or aggression. Animals also have to be killed simply because of a lack of space.

The situation describes the fact that Tesy does not have any discovery dogs to treat now, but the Cat House has more than 70 inhabitants.

The wildest cases do not enter the Cat House, but are treated on the side of the animal shelter. A wild cat can scare a human to die.

“Sometimes a wild cat can pee under anxiety when a human approaches it,” Tanskanen says.

Finland the workload of animal welfare associations and the number of animal rejections have increased during the corona pandemic. When the umbrella organization Suomen Eläinsuojelu SEY asked its member associations in April last year whether the Korona period had increased the number of animals in need of assistance, all 39 member associations said that the number of animals had not increased.

In a December survey, two associations reported an increase in the number of animals in need of assistance.

“When a survey was conducted in August, one third of the associations said that the need for pet help had increased,” SEY’s Executive Director Maria Lindqvist says.

During the corona period, a record number of pets have been acquired. Many teleworkers realized a long-term dream of getting a pet. Some took the pet on a whim for a moment.

As early as last year, animal welfare associations feared that the animal welfare situation would explode into hands as the pandemic eased and people moved remotely back to the offices.

“Fortunately, the situation so far is better than we feared,” Lindqvist says.

Read more: Organizations fear a pet crisis when people acquire pets in exceptional circumstances

The rejection of Corona-era pets has been seen in England, for example. The BBC reported in the second week of the phenomenon in which a pet taken during the Korona period is brought to the Animal Welfare Association and declared to be a found animal.

Lindqvist says that the method has become familiar in Finland even before the epidemic.

“The fact that one’s own animal is brought to the shelter unexpectedly and unsolicited as a more comfortable animal is an old phenomenon in Finland as well,” says Lindqvist.

Cat house the ultimate room has three large cages. In one of them rests the last pregnant female cat. In the corner of the cage there is a surveillance camera from which the situation of the animal can be monitored around the clock. Sometimes a cat needs the help of a veterinarian for childbirth.

What is a cat’s name?

“It doesn’t have a name yet, even though it lived in a human dwelling before coming here. Fortunately, the owner brought it, because he would not have managed the situation when the puppies were born, ”says Heli Tanskanen.

Discovery cats the fate remains entirely in the account of voluntary animal welfare. In Finland, thousands of wild cats live on the outskirts of human settlements.

“Cats that have escaped into the wild employ the most animal volunteer field,” says Lindqvist.

There is no need to think long about the reason. People do not value cats in the same way as dogs.

More than 90 percent of escaped dogs get back home within a day. More than 20 percent of escaped cats go home to fetch.

“A dog is close to a human and shows his affection in a completely different way than a cat. However, we know today that cats are very attached to their owners, but a cat does not show affection in a way that people find pleasant and counter-affectionate, ”says Lindqvist.

In addition, people live in the minds of a tenacious myth that a cat can manage on its own or even belong to walk freely in nature.

Tesy has sought to find a home for every healthy cat. Usually the cat has to be in the Cat House for more than a month.

The owner of a new cat has to commit to one important rule: A cat from a cat house is an Indoor Cat. It only gets out on the strap.

A pregnant anonymous cat will not get into a new home until its puppies are 14 weeks old.

The female Sheliak, who lives in the adjacent cage, has also had to wait for a new home because she has two two-month-old puppies. Sheliak is a star in the constellation Lyra.

Optional Elina Heinonen is weighing puppies. The female puppy weighs half a pound and the male a hundred grams more. Both the mother and the puppies boldly observe the visitors. They are most interested in the photographer’s camera.

Heinonen has been helping Cat House for a year and a half, and his dream is to train as a pet sitter. In addition to cleaning the cages, a large part of the working time goes to dispelling the tenderness of the cats.

“Now I am giving the two puppies a foster home so that their tenderness will disappear,” Heinonen says.

All cats do not come from the forest, but are also imported from people who, for one reason or another, are no longer able to care for the animal.

There are many reasons for rejections. Allergies, changes in family circumstances or family additions are often cited as reasons for giving up. Dogs also end up on the animal route to animal welfare associations, in which case the animal has been taken from a violent home, for example, to safety.

“Many times a month, we get questions about whether we can help when an animal needs a new home. Fortunately, our animal welfare associations have a common channel where help can be found quite quickly, ” Britt-Marie Juup Tesy says.

About 700 cats passed through Tesy last year.

“A lot more animals would be coming, but more can’t be taken. Before winter, we try to hurt cat populations. Winter is terrible for them when they are sick and have to cope with bad food, ”says Juup.

SEY’s according to animal welfare notices have increased during the Korona period. The majority of reports relate to harassing behavior or abuse in dogs, while abuse in cats usually kept indoors is often hidden.

In the third cage is a Mimosa cat with her puppy. Mimosa came to the nursing home with his seven siblings from a human apartment. The animals had not been cared for, so Mimosa and three other females were pregnant. The owner had imagined only two of the cats to be females.

“When cats gave birth, most of the kittens were not viable due to inbreeding,” says Tanskanen.

Mimosa is the second brightest star in the constellation of the Southern Cross.

Cats the situation may be improving. The citizens’ initiative aimed at their compulsory registration was in the second week in the parliamentary debate. Registration would likely discourage rejections. In addition, the obligations of owners are likely to be increased and it aims to prevent the unrestricted breeding of cats.

Read more: Citizens’ initiative calls for mandatory registration of cats – initiative collects more than 50,000 signatures and progresses to parliament

“Right now, there are a lot more cats than there are helpers. It’s really hard and difficult for an animal keeper to face the suffering of cats, in addition to facing the suffering of cats, ”says Lindqvist.

When we leave the Cat House, Heli Tanskanen says that the caretakers gave the pregnant cat the name Apus or Paradise Bird. The constellation of the bird of paradise is a modest constellation located in the southern starry sky.