When does 1 + 1 x 3 = 50? Perhaps it works better as a story problem. If you add a female cat to a male cat, and then multiply the results by three years, how many cats and kittens might you have? Cats are prolific. It's possible for two unaltered cats and their offspring to produce 50 or more kittens in three years.
It's not uncommon for cat rescues to receive phone calls such as this, "A stray cat showed up in our yard three years ago. Now we're overrun with cats and kittens. We need help." Enter the super heroes of cat rescue-women. In West Michigan, every cat rescue is headed by a woman. Women also work the frontline-they live-trap cats, transport them for spay/neuter surgeries, provide foster homes, do adoptions, fund-raise, and answer the calls for injured cats, strays and unwanted litters of kittens. In this collection of short stories, you'll learn about women who devote their spare time, sometimes their entire lives, to helping cats. Women like letter carrier Gina Marvin who noticed numerous stray and feral cats on her postal route in a low-income neighborhood in Grand Rapids. She bought a live trap and began trapping. That led her to starting
Focus on Ferals,
a nonprofit dedicated to cats. Seventeen years later, Gina's still delivering mail, and
Focus on Ferals
has close to 150 volunteers. They have trapped more than 4,000 cats and found homes for approximately 3,000 cats. Meet the women. Be inspired. Get involved. Become part of the solution to cat overpopulation.