Why won’t we come trap for you? It’s kitten season, and everyone is seeing moms and babies under their decks now. And guess what? Everyone is wanting “someone” to come and trap them! We strongly advocate winter trapping exactly for this reason – trap BEFORE the babies start coming. But that doesn’t solve the problem today, does it? Those moms and babies need to be trapped – and we are a community cat group, focused on trap/neuter/return – why won’t we come out and trap?

Animal Outreach of Shelby County formed to TEACH – we teach YOU how to trap. We have the teach a woman to fish philosophy (“Give a woman a fish and you feed her for a day. Teach a woman to fish and you feed her for a lifetime.”) – If someone comes and traps for you, they’ve solved your problem for a day. If we teach you how to trap, we’ve helped you deal with your cat issues for the rest of your life.

If one person has a mom and 4 babies living under their deck, that’s a doable trapping site. But imagine being a volunteer and having FOUR people with a mom and babies living under their deck contact you all in the same week! And all 4 would like YOU to trap them, and take the babies away – mom too if you can, but oh well if she has to come back… And now YOU are going to have 16 babies to foster, socialize, spay/neuter, vaccinate, treat for fleas and worms, microchip, and find homes for. PLUS you have to TNR the moms – and oh yes, the dads. AND then you have to deal with the next week, when you have four more calls with moms and babies under the deck…

You can see why people burn out and stop doing rescue – they care, they want to help, but in just a week they can become overwhelmed. The point is, one time is totally doable, and enjoyable! It’s fun to trap and rescue a litter of kittens – it’s fun to tame them, and make sure they get into good homes. And you feel really good when you have trapped and spayed the mom, and released her to continue living instead of being trapped and killed, or living a life as a continual baby-making machine. And we can HELP YOU – we can connect you to free resources, loan you all the equipment, walk you through the whole process. THAT’S what we do – and we want to. Sometimes volunteers even end up helping you do the trapping, or finding foster homes – but Animal Outreach of Shelby County does NOT ever try to make others feel they “should”. Because that’s not what we do. We are here to help “feed you for a lifetime” – and hope you will go on to help others learn to feed themselves. That’s what a community is all about.

If you want to attend a free online class and learn, email us at kerryann@shelbycats. If you are a member of a group and would like a special class held just for your group – let us know. If your group is always looking for “someone” to come trap, let us help your group learn how to trap! Because THIS is what we do.