Time to Trap!

The annual trapping visit is currently being organised. An announcement has been in the local press now for 2 weeks and we are taking calls from people who need help with neutering feral cats. The first team are due to arrive on Saturday (16th October) with a second team due out on the 30th October. Both teams are here for 1 week and will endeavour to trap and neuter as many cats as can be afforded.
The budget is tight this year but we now ask people to donate a minimum amount and anyone who is going direct to the vet is asked to pay 40 euros. This helps to keep the bill under control.
So...the cages and traps have all been checked, cat food has been bought and the paperwork is about to be organised...then it is full steam ahead!
Of course now that we have our new system in place with the approval form, this means that we can continue year round to help people who can take the cat/s direct to the vet themselves...as long as the budget lasts.
We hope to concentrate on San Antonio this time as there are many cats living there in colonies and kittens just keep being born; many to die, sadly, in awful circumstances.
All the volunteers desperately want to make a difference to the lives of these poor cats and they give up their holidays to do so...and pay for flights. Thankfully we have benefactors on the island who offer accommmodation so that saves money for the important tasks ahead. Every cent goes towards the cats.
Check back with us Mid November when we'll have news and stories on how the volunteers got on.

Getting Ready!

The bi-annual trip to Ibiza by care4cats needs a fair bit of organising and that's been taking up time over the last few weeks.
One of the important things we've managed to do is to produce leaflets printed in 3 languages (English, Spanish and German) so we can inform everyone on the island about the charitys work. Interestingly more and more Spanish residents are finding out about the charity which is good news as often they are feeding colonies of cats that keep on growing yet feel they have no where to turn for help.
care4cats are keen to work with anyone feeding cat colonies as we can be sure they're in a safe environment with regular food and someone looking out for them. Once these colonies are neutered we keep in touch with them so we can stay on top of any new cats that turn up, usually because they've been abandoned. This is a happy solution all round.

Ibiza is an island full of good hearted people who take the time to feed cat colonies out of their own pocket. It's a hard, and expensive job, and often they fall victim to other people who abandon their cats thinking 'ah someone is looking after them...so they're OK'.
One lady in San Antonio, Maria, has been feeding colonies of cats all around the town for 20 yrs or more and has never missed a day. Until a few years ago she had no way of controlling their numbers and has often suffered abuse by residents because they feel she encourages the cats to live in the town. Sadly people are totally ignorant and don't realise that cat colonies start by someone abandoning a domestic cat that is un-neutered.

So...we have lots of new cages to transport cats, plenty of newspapers to keep them comfy whilst in captivity, dried food, tins of meat and of course tuna...always a favourite for trapping difficult cats.

The team of regular volunteers from the UK and Es Cana are, this year, being helped by a small number of new residents which is great. And as they're all from the San Antonio side of the island then it means this area can really be concentrated on.
The announcement of the visit is in the newspaper and calls are coming in thick and fast...as always, it's going to be a busy time!