They might have 9 lives, but spending even part of 1 life as a homeless cat isn’t much fun.

2006 was an emotional time for this particular cat lover and a few of our neighbours, as we rescued not 1 but FOUR cats, that had been left to fend for themselves by their previous owners in and around the Key West area of South Harbour.

Though what we discovered as we tried to do the right thing astounded us:

Apparently the Cats Protection League volunteers are no strangers to Sovereign Harbour, as there have been a growing number of stray cats left to rely on handouts, and at the mercy of any sympathetic residents.

It seems that some uncaring members of society want the affections of a cat whilst they live in the marina, but then can’t be bothered to take them when they move.

This is especially true of the many rented properties around the marina.

The four cats we rescued, were in fact all from one house where there had been a broken relationship, and although a number of neighbours took pity on them and fed them for around a year, with Winter coming up it just wasn’t fair to leave them outside.

One of them was also bordering becoming feral which makes it more difficult to re-house them later.

Although there was a lot of tears, and scratched arms, over two journeys we managed to get the cats to the East Grinstead head office of the Cats Protection League.

These 4 cats were very lucky as through persistence and assisted by a number of very helpful local volunteers, we managed to find somewhere with enough space for them all. Cats Protection, like many similar animal welfare organisation, rely on public donations to keep them going.

So next time you go to the local Supermarket, why not by some cat (or dog) food and put them in the provided boxes for local welfare centres.

Thanks on behalf of the animals you’ll be helping

Carole

A PS for Dog Lovers: there will be articles on dogs on this blog as well in the near future, but this issue really annoyed me, so I wrote it first ;-)