Animal Welfare Professionals

At our shelter, and I'm sure many others are like this as well, our dog volunteer program is fairly robust but our cat volunteer program is pretty lacking in my opinion. For the dogs we have dog walkers of different levels (red, yellow, and green), canine welfare volunteers to help with feeding and cleaning, playgroup volunteers, and dog enrichment volunteers. For cats we have kitten feeders, and feline welfare volunteers, and that's it. I want to have more options for our volunteers, especially when it comes to helping with cat behavior which I'm slowly getting our own cat behavior program more robust as well. My grand idea is to have a similar system to our dog walkers of red, yellow, and green volunteers where the greens would help enrich the "normal" cats or frustrated cats, yellows would be able to focus more on fearful cats, and reds would help work with the overstim cats. I'm curious what other shelters do with their volunteers and if they have systems like that already.

#Behavior,TrainingandEnrichment
#PeopleManagement(includingVolunteerIntegration)

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Laurel Nelson
Cat Welfare Supervisor
Nebraska Humane Society
NE
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We do not have a system like that for cats but I find the idea very interesting. I would also be curious as to if another shelter has a program like this in place. 

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Erin Robinson
Foster Coordinator
Licking County Humane Society
OH
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This message was posted by a user wishing to remain anonymous

At our shelter we have a very strong community of both "dog buddy" and "cat buddy" volunteers. The morning cat buddies handle feeding, cleaning, getting fresh water, but they also take the time to pet our cats, give them treats, and give them enrichment time. Additionally, we have bird noises and set up tablets in from of kennels to get extra enrichment of our volunteer day is a little light. Our afternoon cat buddies don't necessarily have to do any cleaning (unless there's a big mess) but for the most part, we've seen that if you want to help with the cleaning and dirty work, they will for the love of animals. I know this isn't exactly the answer you're looking for but it's all I know. 

That sounds like a great idea!

Some shelters also are able to have a "shy cat room" or something similar where you could then have multiple tiers of volunteers for the different rooms. 

If all in the same room, I suppose you could have a list posted on the wall of red, yellow, and green. 

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Amanda Gray
Vice President
Operation Liberation
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I work for an all-cat rescue right now, so it's not hard here to focus on the cats - ha! But I used to volunteer for another shelter that had a municipal contract. They had the basic cat volunteer level and you did all the basic cat care and enrichment/play in the main cat room and iso (cats with various illnesses). There were 3 shifts: morning , mid-day and later afternoon/evening. But they also had a cat behavior team. Once you had put in so much time as a regular cat volunteer you could apply to be on the behavior team. It required quite a bit more training, but it was really fun to be on the team. We were able to work with cats designated as behavior cats, cats who weren't eating, and some cats that the basic volunteers were not allowed to handle. We were allowed to move cats from place to place if they needed moved to a new location. We had our own Trello board to communicate with staff and other volunteer team members so that we knew which cats on any given day needed the most attention, what progress had been made, what behaviors we were seeing from certain cats. Teaching objective language is key for this. We had a pile of tools we could use when working with cats including plenty of treats, of course. There was also a separate play room that you could take frustrated cats to play and get some energy out or just give them a break from their enclosure. They also used it as a spot for adopters to interact with cats they were interested in adopting. There was a lot more responsibility, but this still ranks as my favorite volunteer experience. We knew we were making a big difference every time we showed up.

At my current rescue we have added programs like Reading to Cats, where kids come in and read to cats. We incorporated an office cat program for cats who are not doing well in a small enclosure (high energy cats), shy cats, medical cats that need monitoring and can't go to foster yet, etc.  We also have a designated "quiet room" in adoptions where the shy/stressed/anxious cats can be. This room has worked so well that it is now a high-demand area! We have temporarily changed it into an open room for high-energy cats when needed.  Having various spaces and options is essential for cats.

I hope this is helpful.

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Michelle Flowers
Foster Program Manager
Seattle Area Feline Rescue
UW-AAB
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Wow this is super helpful! Right now for our behavior cats I have a white board in my office for the staff that work with them to see, but I love the idea of having a trello board for volunteers to be able to see that as well. I just finished a few training manuals for my staff about objective language and how to categorize different behaviors, our shelter is 150 years old and yet I feel we are so behind with cats it's crazy.

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Laurel Wilton
Cat Welfare Supervisor
Nebraska Humane Society
NE
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Original Message:
Sent: 05-21-2025 11:20 AM
From: Michelle Flowers (She/Her)
Subject: Cat Volunteer Programs

I work for an all-cat rescue right now, so it's not hard here to focus on the cats - ha! But I used to volunteer for another shelter that had a municipal contract. They had the basic cat volunteer level and you did all the basic cat care and enrichment/play in the main cat room and iso (cats with various illnesses). There were 3 shifts: morning , mid-day and later afternoon/evening. But they also had a cat behavior team. Once you had put in so much time as a regular cat volunteer you could apply to be on the behavior team. It required quite a bit more training, but it was really fun to be on the team. We were able to work with cats designated as behavior cats, cats who weren't eating, and some cats that the basic volunteers were not allowed to handle. We were allowed to move cats from place to place if they needed moved to a new location. We had our own Trello board to communicate with staff and other volunteer team members so that we knew which cats on any given day needed the most attention, what progress had been made, what behaviors we were seeing from certain cats. Teaching objective language is key for this. We had a pile of tools we could use when working with cats including plenty of treats, of course. There was also a separate play room that you could take frustrated cats to play and get some energy out or just give them a break from their enclosure. They also used it as a spot for adopters to interact with cats they were interested in adopting. There was a lot more responsibility, but this still ranks as my favorite volunteer experience. We knew we were making a big difference every time we showed up.

At my current rescue we have added programs like Reading to Cats, where kids come in and read to cats. We incorporated an office cat program for cats who are not doing well in a small enclosure (high energy cats), shy cats, medical cats that need monitoring and can't go to foster yet, etc.  We also have a designated "quiet room" in adoptions where the shy/stressed/anxious cats can be. This room has worked so well that it is now a high-demand area! We have temporarily changed it into an open room for high-energy cats when needed.  Having various spaces and options is essential for cats.

I hope this is helpful.

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Michelle Flowers
Foster Program Manager
Seattle Area Feline Rescue
UW-AAB
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This message was posted by a user wishing to remain anonymous

At my shelter, we have a cat enrichment program that is implemented by our volunteers on a daily basis (assuming one is signed up for the day). It coincides with our dog enrichment program (they do both), but the program mainly consists of completing one training where we cover which cats are eligible for enrichment (we don't give additional enrichment to colony cats as they get plenty of stimulation from the public), where to find the enrichment, what the purpose is, etc. There are no prerequisites/tiers required to do the training. 

After that, volunteers that have a shift that day will come in and follow the posted enrichment schedule for that day. Our schedule consists of paper bag with treats, hanging toys from top of kennel for them to swat at, feliway, fly by treats, empty easter eggs (they roll around easily! can also include a mild scent in there), and puzzle bowls. We used to do lick mats but the cats were starting to eat them as they would be left in for a while so caution around using lick mats, or recommend just smearing on kennel or a sturdier lick mat situation.  Afterwards, the volunteers track the enrichment/whether the cat liked it on a log in the animal's kennel card. 

Otherwise, we also have a volunteer opportunity for volunteers to assist with our vet team for intake exams. It's a good chance for them to see how we handle fearful cats in a fear free manner and be able to implement these techniques hands-on. Also, no requisites for this and it's a pretty popular position. 

I work in the behavior department at my shelter. Last year, my coworker debuted "TAILS"- Teaching And Implementing Life Skills. This is a position for people to work with some of the staff only dogs, do things like click for calm, and train new behaviors. This year, I was able to start CatTAILS! I have eight volunteers so far, and we've been doing training classes every other week. They have been working on clicker training for cats that need more enrichment, and work on behavior modification with more of our shy friends. This is still a work in progress and the classes are still going on, but I think it has been great so far! There is only so much we can do with staffing, so having these volunteers to work with staff only cats has been a game changer.

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Aubrey Richardson
Behavior and Training Staff
Lollypop Farm
NY
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Our shelter has three levels of cat volunteers. Level 1 interacts with cats in the adoption rooms. There are three sub-levels of Level 2. The Holding rooms, the Nursery, and Iso. Training is required for each of these sub-assignments. There is also a Bottle Baby feeding assignment open to all levels. Training for these assignments are done by the Volunteer Department, and these volunteers work independently. Level 3s are trained by, work closely with, and report to the Feline Behavior Department to do enrichment, socialize cats in the Fraidy Cats Program, move cats from Holding to Adoptions, do assessments, and other tasks that are Feline-Behavior level. 

I hope this is helpful.

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Fay Crisanto
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