Hillsborough Pet Shelter Cat Surplus - Chelsea Waldeck Pet Resource Center

Hillsborough County's Pet Resource Center is 600 percent over capacity for cats. We talk with the center's Chelsea Waldeck about the causes of the cat population explosion and how they're working to adopt those cats out (adoption fees are waived). 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Gordon Bird here with Beyond the News. If you want
to bring a cat into the house and you live
in Hillsborough County, this may be a good time to
do it. Cat populations are soaring at Hillsborough County's operated shelter,
the Pet Resource Center on Falkenberg Road. Chelsea Waldeck with
the Pet Resource Center joins us now to talk about
their feline population explosion and what you can do about it.

(00:23):
Chelsea Waldeck, welcome, thank you so much for having me.
I understand it's kind of unusual to have a cat
population explosion at this time of year. How many do
you have on hand in the shelter and why are
you suddenly seeing them all at once?

Speaker 2 (00:37):
That's correct. Usually this time of year is when we
start to see our numbers actually declining a little bit.
Usually our big peaks are in June, July, and August.
But right now we have about three hundred and sixty
cats here at the shelter, which is about six hundred
and fifty percent of our capacity, and.

Speaker 1 (00:56):
Your capacity somewhere around fifty six. So you have three
hundred and sixties, so that's that's way over capacity.

Speaker 2 (01:02):
How are you dealing with all that it is a
way over capacity. So for us right now to manage this.
You know, if we're getting litters of kittens in or
cats that come in together, we are housing them together.
So you may go up to a kennel and see
four or five cats in one kennel, or you know,
we're we have to get creative, and we have some
cats and kittens in offices. We have about ninety eight

(01:26):
currently out in foster. So those are either medical cases
or behavioral cases that need some socialization or some help,
or kittens that are out that aren't quite old enough
to go up for adoption.

Speaker 1 (01:39):
So there are a good number of these that are
going to be adoptable. Is there anyone factor as to
why you're seeing all this cat activity once?

Speaker 2 (01:48):
No, So looking at the data, is actually quite widespread.
So we are seeing, you know, some owner surrenders coming
in this time of year, which is not unheard of
for us, but we are seeing an uptake uptick in that.
We are also still seeing a lot of strays coming in,
so we're seeing ones that are sick and injured. We're

(02:08):
seeing kittens still coming in. You know, thankfully we haven't
really had much of our hurricane season this year knock
on wood. But you know, with that, you know a
lot of times when we do have those storms rolling through,
the cats and kittens are hunkering down, they're hiding, they're
a little bit less visible. So now with them out
and about a lot more, they're being seen, they're coming in.
So we always want to remind the community that if

(02:30):
you do happen to see kittens out, you know, and
you don't see Mamara, that doesn't mean that she has
abandoned them. It's usually meaning she is off finding food,
taking some time away from the kids, and then she's
going to come back and feed them later. So we
don't want to kidnap any of her kittens.

Speaker 1 (02:46):
Now, what what do people need to do if they
are interested in adopting? How do they what kind of
what kind of information? What kind of money do they
need to bring to the Hillsboro Pet Resource Center.

Speaker 2 (03:00):
Yeah, so right now all of our adoption fees are
waved thanks to a grant from ASPCA, so those will
be waved through the month of November. So if you
are interested in adopting, now is a great time. We
are here Monday through Saturday from ten am to five
pm and you can just come out and as long
as you have proof of identification and are older than
eighteen years old, we would be more than happy to

(03:20):
try and help get you set up with a new
family member.

Speaker 1 (03:23):
So the adoption fees have been waved. Does that include
shots and the whole package?

Speaker 2 (03:28):
Yep. Yes, So all of our pets, dogs and cats
do leave spada neutered, microchipped, vaccinated, the whole nine yards,
so they are set to go. All you need to
do is as soon as you get them home, try
and get them scheduled with your veterinarian to get them
checked out because they're getting just you know, basics, to
make sure that they're doing okay and ready for adoption.

Speaker 1 (03:46):
Here, that's a great deal if you could get out again.
The location of the Pet Resource Center, hours that you're open,
everything people need to know. Yep.

Speaker 2 (03:55):
So we are located at four to four zero North
Falkenberg Road. We're right next to the County Jail and
we are open Monday through Saturday from ten am to
five pm. And if you're interested in our pets that
we have available, you can go ahead and look online
at their profiles to see pictures of them, ages, some
information if we have it, about them all on our

(04:16):
website at HCFL dot gov slash pets.

Speaker 1 (04:19):
Chelsea Waldeck with the Hillsboro County Pet Resource Center, thank
you very much for joining us on beyond the news.

Speaker 2 (04:26):
Thank you