KEWANEE, Ill (KWQC) – The Kewanee Police Department has introduced it’s not accepting feral cats at its animal management facility and is implementing a restrict of 12 cats at its holding facility at any given time. The division introduced the change on Facebook Tuesday saying the change is because of a scarcity of capability and restricted sources.
In addition, Kewanee Police Chief Stephen Kijanowski says the choice will assist guarantee the protection and well-being of the animals within the care and maintain the workload manageable.
“So we addressed the issue by looking into the law for feral cats about what a feral cat is, and that it’s basically an animal that does not have human relationships. And that is a danger to be around, basically. And we will treat it as a wild animal, we don’t take wild animals into the pound,” mentioned Kijanowski.
The President of the Henry County Humane Society’s Kewanee Chapter, Lousie Harrison says there’s a main distinction between feral cats and home strays. She says employees members have skilled a number of biting incidents involving feral cats.
“Stray domestic cats might be scared and hiss at you. But in a day or two, it’ll calm down and you’ll be able to handle it. But a feral cat, you cannot. You can’t safely handle you can’t put your hands in the cage. It makes it really difficult to look after them at the shelter to feed them to keep the litter boxes clean. These cats are strong, some of them busted out of wire cages,” mentioned Harrison.
The division and humane society say they’ve additionally been exploring methods to higher assist misplaced cats and dogs get again home. They have been speaking about holding a micro-chipping occasion however the plan continues to be within the early levels.
“At the moment to get your animal microchip, you would have to go to a local vet, make an appointment and go to a local vet. There are a lot of people who maybe can’t afford to do that. And that’s why we came up with the idea to see if we could have a free event. If that happens. It’s it’s only going to be later this year, possibly in September. It’s going to take a while to set it up,” mentioned Harrison.
According to the town, their animal management facility took in not less than 250 cats in 2023, with 10% p.c of them being feral.
The Kewanee Police Department says you’ll be able to assist be sure that your pet is returned to you when misplaced is by registering your pet with the town. Information will be discovered on the City of Kewanee’s web site.
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