Venice Cat Coalition

2024 Kitten Emergency Rescue

Please help us save more kittens in our 3-county area: Sarasota/Venice area; Charlotte/North Port/Port Charlotte; and Desoto counties. The pandemic and hurricane combined damage to the cat rescue world in our area has not ended yet! You probably know about the spay-neuter and veterinarian shortages impacting all the kitten rescuers' programs this summer, the result of several years of inadequate spay-neuter at affordable prices for the last four years. Now the shelters are euthanizing baby kittens unless a rescue pulls them.

It has really come home to roost this summer, with literally thousands of small kittens being born around here, and few options on how to help them stay alive! The shelters are overloaded with kittens and lovely adult cats. The Venice Cat Coalition is very small, but we are focused on helping as many kittens and mother cats as we can. We’ve taken in dozens, plus fixed the mother cats, and the calls are constant, begging for more help.

Two examples in the last 2 months involved one residence with 30-plus cats in the woods behind the caretakers’ house. VCC pulled 10 kittens (beautiful but with ringworm and underweight) and arranged for another 14 adults to get fixed and vaccinated. We are currently working another site where a young man somehow took in 11 unfixed adult cats, and the females birthed numerous litters in a very short time. He had 24 kittens that he does not want, and we have worked that down to about 11 in his custody. So far, we have arranged for all but one of the adults to be fixed and vaccinated. None of these cats had ever received medical care, basic or otherwise. Since he could not afford kitten food, VCC sent $150 of emergency kitten dry and wet food to help the babies survive, as we search for places to rehome them. Just two examples of the big projects we have taken on.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. Kitten rescue is very expensive now, costing between $100 and $250 per kitten depending on the conditions. Last year (2023), we spent about $20,000 on kitten emergency work, and now we are facing similar bills. Please consider a nice donation, large or small, to help these innocent babies get through a difficult time. We appreciate all who donated and supported our kitten emergency drive last summer, and we need your help again.

"A COPY OF THE OFFICIAL REGISTRATION AND FINANCIAL INFORMATION MAY BE OBTAINED FROM THE DIVISION OF CONSUMER SERVICES BY CALLING TOLL-FREE (800-435-7352) WITHIN THE STATE. REGISTRATION DOES NOT IMPLY ENDORSEMENT, APPROVAL, OR RECOMMENDATION BY THE STATE." Our DOACS number is CH34716.

Ask your tax preparer about how you can make this a Qualified Charitable Distribution.

Contact us at our website at www.venicecatcoalition.com or find us on Facebook. Many thanks for your consideration.

UPDATE 5/1/23: Thanks to all you wonderful people, we reached our $1,000 goal this morning, and have increased it by $500 to keep paying it forward a few more days. Today, eight older cats are getting fixed (courtesy of VCC's donors/free to homeless cats and low income folks). More kittens were taken in by the trappers over the weekend, and several of the kittens will get vet care Thursday. We will have some available to adopt within about one week. There are still a lot under this VCC project, a constantly changing number but somewhere around 40 at the moment (Of the 130 cited earlier, another rescue Feline Friends is responsible for about 90 of those... and we hear that number is down to 70 but those rescuers certainly need more help as well.) There is a 15 cat TNR project going on Thursday and I'll betcha they find a few more little babies. Thanks so much for saving them!

Kitten Emergency: TNVR volunteers have pulled some 130 small kittens from various locations in S. Sarasota County and DeSoto County, areas struck hard by Hurricane Ian in September. The large number of kittens has overwhelmed the trappers and small rescues resources and they are desparately in need of medical supplies/care, food and litter. The Venice Cat Coalition is sponsoring a fund raising project to obtain these resources for about 35 of the kittens. Our goal is $1,000 and if you can help please do. Or share to cat-loving friends who can. The volunteers are willing to do the work to get the kittens into adoptable share and into homes but each one will cost an estimated $100-$200 to bring it to that point. Please help!

Want to join me in making a difference? I'm raising money to benefit Venice Cat Coalition, and any donation will help make an impact. Thanks in advance for your contribution to this cause that means so much to me.

More information about Venice Cat Coalition: The Venice Cat Coalition supports feral cat programs and reductions in euthanasia of cats in local shelters, providing low or no-income cat owners with emergency help where possible and advocating on behalf of humane, No Kill treatment of felines.