De-sexing stops kitten caboodle

The Herald talks to the SPCA to find out how we can be better friends to our animals. In the second of a five-part series, Amelia Wade reports on the ongoing fight to sterilise pets to reduce stray cat numbers

This year, SPCA Auckland took in 11,000 animals — and of the 82 received in the past few days, 71 of those were kittens.

Over summer, the society’s animal village in Mangere is flooded with litter upon litter of kittens.

The staff have one message for cat owners — get your pet de-sexed. And if you come across a stray, drop it off at the SPCA so they can take care of it.

SPCA Auckland veterinary manager Dr Shalsee Vigeant said the summer was always the worst season for unwanted or stray kittens. From November until the end of March, the village in Mangere would receive anywhere from 30 to 80 cats a day, most of them strays.

Dr Vigeant said cats could breed at an “insane” rate — from 6 months old to 12 years old cats can reproduce — and they can have up to three litters a year. Each litter usually has between two and four, but sometimes eight, kittens.

She urged owners to take advantage of free community de-sexing programmes, which sterilised 1600 animals this year, and said if people had missed out, to take their cat to the vet for the simple and relatively cheap operation.

SPCA Auckland chief executive Andrea Midgen said de-sexing was the most important thing people could do to manage the animal population. And because it prevented unwanted animals, it potentially also stopped cruelty.

“If you just got it down to people only having entire animals, if you like to call them that, it’s only breeders who are making the choice consciously to have kittens or litters or puppies, then that would be amazing.”

As well as de-sexing your own animal, Ms Midgen urged New Zealanders to hand over any strays in their neighbourhood to the SPCA, especially if they were cats. She recommended catching them with food.

Ms Midgen said SPCA Auckland was working with the council on a joint initiative to put a long-term strategy in place for stray dogs. She expected to be able to announce something next year.

Veterinary Association Companion Animal Society president Dr Brendon Bullen said the cost of de-sexing in New Zealand was low considering the expertise and equipment involved.

De-sexing is done under general anaesthesia.

Dr Bullen said most animals that he de-sexed at his practice recovered that night “as if nothing had happened”.