Along with action movies, warm-weather fashions and cool new drinks, this summer also has brought a heart-breaking sight: a huge increase in the number of stray cats.
If you’ve noticed more felines lately on city streets, in backyards and vacant lots, you’re not imagining things. The summer could go down as one of the worst for controlling the cat population. Every corner, it seems, is home to a stray.
Shelters say they’re overrun with homeless cats, and some have stopped taking them in.
At The Humane Society in Manhattan, there are currently 150 cats available for adoption, and half of those are kittens. Meanwhile, the Queens shelter Animal Haven has more than 200 cats – “more than we’ve ever had,” reports shelter worker Marcello Forte. “People will bring in entire boxes of homeless or unwanted kittens,” Forte says.
Why has this happened? Experts point to the obvious cause: too many animals left unspayed or unneutered.
While animal advocates constantly urge cat owners to “fix” their pets, not enough New Yorkers follow that advice. Some even encourage their pets to breed.
The second, less obvious reason for the current cat crisis is the warmer weather itself.
In the cold months, pet felines stay indoors and homeless cats take refuge in semi-covered areas, explains Sandra DeFeo of the Humane Society of New York.
“Winter brings the cat population down, because many homeless cats die of exposure to the elements if they can’t find a warm hiding place,” she says.
But during the summer, homeless cats come out of hiding and wander, and more people let their unfixed pets out into backyards.
“Cats reproduce very quickly,” DeFeo explains. “The gestation period is only two months, and they can start having kittens as early as 6 months. They can also become pregnant while they’re nursing.”
The result, she says, is that one fertile female cat can give birth to as many as 24 kittens in a year.
Experts say that owners often become overwhelmed by the noise of crying kittens and the cost and responsibility of caring for them, so they leave cats outdoors to fend for themselves or abandon them at shelters.
Shelters, in turn, become overwhelmed. “We’ve had to completely stop taking in cats,” says Forte.
In May, the city passed a new law requiring that all animals adopted from shelters or purchased at pet stores be fixed before they go home. The law takes effect in November.
While that’s good news for the long term, the bad news is that come November, there will be hundreds more homeless felines roaming the city.
Now is an excellent time to welcome a cat into your home.
Shelters, including the Center for Animal Care and Control and ASPCA, offer a wide selection of different feline types, colors, and sizes. All healthy, de-wormed, and screened for common diseases.
So contact an agency or pet store that offers rescued cats for adoption, including Metropets (594 Ninth Ave.), Spoiled Brats (340 West 49th St.) and Petco’s two Manhattan locations (147 East 86th St. and 860 Broadway).
