Karen Wilkes, creator of cat rescue organisation Kitty Kingdom Canterbury, and Tina Hartley are requiring a law needing owners to get their cat desexed and microchipped.
They just recently met Waimakariri Mayor Dan Gordon and pointed out comparable laws that have actually been embraced by the Selwyn District Council and the Wellington City Council.
The concern capped just recently when a cat was discovered hurt after being captured in a gin trap – typically utilized for capturing possums – in main Rangiora.
‘‘We got the call about this cat which people had been feeding over the last few years,’’ Ms Wilkes said.
‘‘If he had been microchipped he probably wouldn’t have actually been walking the streets as a roaming for so long.’’
But this was simply the suggestion of the iceberg, as there were various circumstances of cats being disposed near rivers and in backwoods.
‘‘People are just dumping cats and leaving them,’’ Ms Hartley said.
‘‘And if individuals dispose them at the Ashley River they will damage the birdlife due to the fact that they require food.
‘‘What Karen is trying to do is trap them, and then get them desexed and rehomed, so we can stop this population explosion.’’
Ms Wilkes said one female cat might have 4 or 5 litters of kittens in a year – with approximately 5 in each litter – if she was not desexed.
Over 8 years, more than 2 million descendants might be reproduced from one female cat, she said.
‘‘People are already threatening to poison or harm cats and some are already doing it – so something needs to be done.’’
Mr Gordon said he was checking out the Selwyn law and had actually composed to the proper federal government minister.
However, he thought it would be hard to implement a law.
‘‘I believe in order for a law like that to be effective, it most likely requires to be embraced by all councils in the area.
‘‘This is to stop litters being born in Christchurch, where there is no bylaw, and being driven into rural areas to be dumped.’’
Kittens might be desexed at 10 weeks, or when they weighed 1kg. They might be microchipped at the exact same time.
Ms Wilkes required a nationwide database of microchipped cats to be established.
‘‘I’m constantly scanning rescued cats and hoping, ‘Please let it be chipped’.’’
She was making an application for grants to help individuals get their family pets desexed.
– By David Hill
Local Democracy Reporter
Public interest journalism moneyed through New Zealand on Air.
