Animal Welfare Professionals

Did you attend or have you viewed the Million Cat Challenge webcast with Katie Ingram of Placer County Animal Services, "Outsourcing Neonatal Kitten Rearing for Life-Saving Success"? This is the place for follow-up questions and discussion!

Neonatal kittens pose a unique challenge for animal shelters as one of the most vulnerable and fragile animals that come through our doors. Through lifesaving efforts, shelters are increasingly able to care for and save these tiny shelter residents.  Placer County Animal Services has tackled this challenge through an innovative and creative solution.

What do you think? Will you give it a try?

Kitten Central is also monitoring this post and will happily answer any of the questions that were posed during the webcast.

You guys are awesome! Neonatal medicine is my dream. You all are very inspiring. Keep up the great work 

What is PCAS total budget for kitten season including in shelter program plus kitten central? 

What a great innovative and amazing program!!  Do non-RVT volunteers tube feed neonatal kittens? At our shelter, we have volunteers who are interested but I don't know how difficult this would be to learn correctly. 

Currently only the rvts do it. A couple of the more senior volunteers certainly could learn.  I think you just need to be aware of natural skill level. Not everyone who wants to learn it could preform it appropriately. This is something the supervisor or rvts should be deciding on. Even after the teaching if they feel uncomfortable then that isn't something they should be doing alone. Nothing will kill a volunteer faster than being responsible for the death of a baby, even accidentally.