Fine felines: Charity receives grant to expand kitten nursery

A CHARITY offering a low-cost and free cat desexing program to the Greater Geelong community has received funding from the state government to refurbish its kitten nursery.

Launched in 2018, the team behind Project Meow Geelong work to prevent the unnecessary breeding that leaves cats and kittens on the streets, overcrowding shelters and putting pressure on local wildlife, relying on donations from the community to support its work.

Its focus is on education, facilitating desexing procedures and offering financial support to cat owners, working closely with Geelong West’s Aberdeen Vet Clinic, where procedures are carried out; and Geelong Animal Rescue, which helps to rehome the animals that need it.

The $52,000 grant, provided through the Animal Welfare Fund Grants Program, will enable Project Meow to expand its Kitten Club, a program that aims to prevent people giving kittens away, allowing the charity to safely house up to three cats and their litters at the one time and provide emergency housing to surrendered cats when required.

“You give us all the litter and we will desex the mum for free and we will rehome the kittens and get them on the right path, so they don’t become tomorrow’s breeders, and they get the vet care that they must have to have healthy lives,” Project Meow founder Lisa Kearns said.

She said the motivation for establishing the desexing program arose after she spent some time volunteering at an animal shelter.

She became concerned the shelter was unwittingly contributing to the widespread problem of cat breeding and lacked the time or resources to develop preventative programs.

Ms Kearns then discovered that there were a significant number of cat owners in the community willing to “accept help, if there was help there for them”.

“If we can help these people, that’s going to help our shelters, our rescue groups, our council, our animal management, the health of the cats in the community, our environment, our wildlife.

“There were just so many reasons why this just had to happen.”

One non-desexed cat, her mate and their offspring can produce as many as 2,100 cats in just a four-year period, and Project Meow’s work has already helped to eliminate more than 17,000 cats from the breeding pool, with about 97 kittens already benefiting from the charity’s support this year.

“Breeding is not that one season anymore. Breeding is happening all year round,” Ms Kearns said.

“This is why Project Meow is so important, because we offer this desexing assistance every month of the year.”

Project Meow hope the refurbishment of its kitten nursery will be completed by the end of the year, and in the interim is encouraging both volunteers and organisations interested in sponsoring or supporting its work to get in touch.

For more information, head to projectmeow.org.au