www.houltonanimalshelter.com
Cats make lives better in a million different ways. June is American Humane’s Adopt-a-cat month. In the spring and summer, animal shelters are inundated with kittens. Make your life – and theirs – a million times better by adopting one from your local shelter and welcoming a new member to your family. Enrich your world – get a cat.
These are the words from the American Humane Associations’ drive to move a million cats into new homes in June. 180 of these cats can be viewed at the Houlton Animal Shelter. There are cats everywhere – the community cat room is overflowing, every time you open the door cats fly out into the hallway, there are cats in isolation, quarantine, the kitten room, the old building, in the dog kennels, everywhere.
A couple of weeks ago there was a report of an animal shelter in the lower New England area that had to be closed because the owner had died and made no provisions for the continuation of her Shelter. The Shelter was full of cats, just as we are, and the rumor was that these cats were in danger of immediate “termination.”
People from all over the country flocked to help place these cats because they were going to die. Yet in our situation, because we are a no-kill Shelter and there is no imminent fear of death, people seem to have lost their compassion for the month after month that these animals languish in cages or are confined to one room.
I can remember when it was almost “stylish” to say that you “rescued” an animal from a pound or shelter. Now the Shelters are healthy comfortable living quarters so there seems to be less of an urgency to “rescue” one. Yet every single day, more and more animals are brought in by animal control. Animals that have been neglected, abused, abandoned, animals who do desperately need to be “rescued” and only you can rescue them.
Our job is supposed to be temporary. The animal shelter has taken on the responsibility to provide a temporary home for all of these pets. We did not create the situation but we’ve willingly accepted the challenge to home them, provide veterinary care for them, and then place them.
Our job has never been to keep them till they die of old age. It just breaks my heart to go to the Shelter every day and see the kitten room full of adult cats. You know why adult cats are in the kitten room? Because a year ago, this room was full of kittens and they all grew up at the shelter.
Please do what you can to help. If you have enough cats, then talk to your friends, neighbors, maybe even your grandmother. She might like a quiet older lap cat to keep her company in her later years.
Perhaps you do know of an elderly person who would love a companion but they can’t tend to the litter box. How about volunteering to take care of that for them. Maybe you know someone with just one cat who would love a playmate. I say this week in and week out, we service an area of 25,000 people, and I find it very hard to believe there aren’t 180 homes out of 25,000 people.
If you can’t adopt, perhaps you would just like to help us with the cost of care. The animal shelter operates day to day, week to week, struggling to cover payroll, fuel oil bills, and veterinary bills. Your donation, even if it’s just $1, will go a long way. A bag of cat litter is helpful, anything you can do. Our thanks to the Katahdin High freshman class for their drive to help the animals, last week they donated food, litter and collars for the animal shelter.
Please help. Our address is P.O. Box 548, Houlton, Me 04730, our telephone is 532-2862 and our location is on the Callaghan Road – you can find us by going out the Ludlow Road (past Wal-Mart), take your second right, and we are a little over a mile in on the right. We can’t continue without you.
