Source: Radio New Zealand
Senior feline attendant Michaela Foggin’s job involves caring, feeding, cleaning, medicating and giving love and attention to the cats during the day. RNZ / Amy Williams
Saturday is Caturday at a south Auckland animal shelter, where a bumper crop of kittens are in desperate need of forever homes.
The SPCA has more than 30 kittens available for adoption at its Māngere Centre, where it says the 40-year-old building is crumbling and part of the cattery floods when it rains.
The organisation has seen a surge in cats needing to be adopted across the country, and it hopes its Caturday events will see people heading home with a new family member in tow.
At the Māngere shelter, Michaela Foggin has a cat-lover’s dream job.
“I am a senior feline attendant so my job during the day is caring for the cats, feeding them, cleaning them, medicating them, making sure they get all the love and attention possible.”
The part of the Māngere animal shelter that does not flood. RNZ / Amy Williams
She will be helping to adopt out the bumper crop of kittens.
“We’ll do walk-ins and they can come through, look at all the kittens we have available for adoption, meet some, cuddle some and they usually pick you so it can be pretty easy when you’re coming in to meet and adopt a kitten.”
More than 30 kittens are available for adoption at the Māngere shelter, where vet Nathan Wong has worked for five years.
“We’re inundated with cats and kittens at this time. The reason for that is with the warmer weather they always want to have babies at this time of year which is really cute,” he said.
“There’s more cats than we’ve got cages to deal with so Caturdays is one of those things where we try to adopt out as many cats as we can because the more cats we adopt out, the more we can take in.”
The SPCA has more than 30 kittens available for adoption at its Māngere Centre. RNZ / Amy Williams
The decades-old shelter is falling apart, riddled with asbestos and rust.
The SPCA said the buildings would need to be vacated this year – a new purpose-built centre is being built in Wiri, due to be finished in November.
Graeme Ford manages the Māngere shelter and said the run-down buildings were risky for both staff and the animals.
He said a worker recently tripped and broke their wrist and thumb – and part of the cattery flooded when it rained.
“We’ve got 18 pens here and nine of them flood, every time we’ve got rain and it’s not heavy rain anymore now it’s just any rain.”
Graeme Ford says the run-down buildings are risky for both staff and the animals. RNZ / Amy Williams
The pens flood deep enough to fill the cats’ water bowls – there are platforms in each pen the cats can safely jump to.
“It’s not ideal for the animals and it’s not ideal for the staff who’ve got to come in the next morning and think this is what they’ve got to take an hour or two out of their day to clean up the mess from the flood.”
A rusty dog kennel at the shelter. RNZ / Amy Williams
Ford said some of the dog kennels were rusting and asbestos had been found in parts of the buildings.
“There’s a lot of asbestos on site. It is stable and it is marked where it is but it’s not ideal especially as the building starts to show some deterioration, we wouldn’t want the deterioration to be shown around the asbestos and put anyone at risk.”
The SPCA’s new shelter in Wiri is due for completion in November and will be a much larger hub, it’s still fundraising for $10 million.
“We need someone with some deep pockets to try and help out and get us there and get these cats and dogs into a better space,” Ford said.
The Māngere centre cared for more than 5500 animals last year and bigger buildings at Wiri will allow an additional 2000 animals to be helped.
Roma Timpson is a vet nurse and seasoned animal foster parent. RNZ / Amy Williams
Meanwhile, Ford said they also needed more foster parents to take animals home for short stays and relieve pressure on their kennels and pens – animal food and any medications are provided.
Roma Timpson is a vet nurse and seasoned foster parent, the day RNZ visited she was taking home two kittens, one had an eye removed, the other a leg amputated.
“It doesn’t have to be forever, it is really hard giving them back but knowing that you’ve done your part to help, you can send them off just knowing they’re ready to go to homes.”
The SPCA said anyone ready to give some T-L-C to some four legged friends can check online when Caturdays are held in their region.
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
