Our values in contributing to the rescue, management, welfare and adoption of street and colony cats includes a recognition that as sentient animals they are capable of suffering including separation anxiety from siblings, companions, and kittens. We do not support the trapping of lactating queens without their kindle and do not support separation of lactating queens and their kittens after trapping until ready to be weened. We regard separation of lactating queens from kindle through trapping as cruel.
We recognise cats and kittens as companion animals and that all cats and kittens, despite their instinctive natural defensive behaviours, subject to improved health as required, have the opportunity to become a loyal companion animal with time and effort. We support behavioural modification and ongoing medical care as required for the best outcomes until adoption.
It is our desire to share the story of our efforts to demonstrate and educate that responsible cat ownership results in less street and colony cats. We are, of course, mindful that despite responsible ownership, cats sometimes get lost. We will always try to reunite cats separated in this way or to work with councils and pounds to find new homes for cats. We are pro-life and do not support euthanising on the grounds that a cat cannot be adopted, has poor prospects of survival over a normal term of life or needs prosthetic or reconstruction surgery. However, we will take all veterinary opinions on board in context in the best interest of the animal to reduce pain and suffering.
We actively promote the desexing and microchipping of cats that come under our care to control undesirable cat population growth but we must also be aware that mixed breed cats should not be eliminated from our society.
Our view is that cats are natural hunters and certain animals may fall prey. We think that where wildlife is impacted, we would support a more rigid containment regime for cats. However, we do not support a one-size-fits-all approach to cat containment. We do not support, but respect council's right to impose, curfews which have not been the subject of wide research and public consultation of stakeholders. We continue to support street cat welfare including the feeding of hungry cats that are homeless so they can be brought in under our programme.
We take the position that where cats create a public nuisance, owners should play their part. In the case of street and colony cats, we think it is within our scope to assist the community, but we don't see it our obligation without community support. We expect property owners to be clear about who they are asking for help. Where property owners elect to have council trap cats on their property, we will not be able to assist them further.
We are community focused and are willing to embrace the welfare of cats in the areas in which our rescuers operate. This includes assisting owners of owned cats with access to desexing, microchipping, council registration and veterinary support and increasing the number of responsible owners in the community that can adopt street and colony cats.
We actively promote farm cat recovery with the cooperation of farmers that may have legal rights under pest control legislation to destroy cats. In many cases, farmers are willing to make an initial donation to to support the cat's desexing and intial vaccinations. We are grateful for their supportive gift and that it produces a mutually beneficial outcome for cat and farmer.
