Eastern Ontario animal rescue seeking support amid surge of abandoned cats

Four kittens abandoned outside a pet store are now in the care of the Ottawa Humane Society. (Peter Szperling/CTV News Ottawa)

A Hawkesbury animal rescue group says it is seeing an increased demand for its services amid an increase in the number of abandoned cats across eastern Ontario.

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Patricia Bracelin, who owns and operates Operation Spay and Neuter in Hawkesbury, Ont., told Newstalk 580 CFRA's Ottawa Now with Kristy Cameron that she's unable to keep up with the demand from residents reporting cat colonies spreading.

The animal rescue has been offering low-cost spay and neuter services for animals since 2012. Bracelin says many adopted cats during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the lifting of restrictions led to many choosing to give up their pets with the high costs of food and veterinary care for animals.

She says the increase in people abandoning pets has turned some parts of Hawkesbury into a "dumping ground" for abandoned pets.

"We've been getting way more calls than normal over the past two years," Bracelin said.

"Four people have reached out just this week regarding cat colonies with 20 to 30 cats per colony."

Bracelin says she's asking municipalities to look into providing more support for low-income households to spay and neuter their pets to reduce the financial burden the services put on low-income families.

"Those pets are not sterilized so, of course, they're having babies and we just can't keep up with the demand," she said.

Capacity crisis affecting Ottawa shelters, clinics

The Ottawa Humane Society has also reported a surge in cats, dogs and other animals being taken in this year. The shelter said it took in 21 homeless kittens from the Windsor/Essex County Humane Society to assist them with a "capacity crisis" last month.

The Humane Society has paused its mobile spay and neuter services for Ottawa cats to meet the needs of the animals in their care.

In Ottawa, a total of 9,046 sterilization surgeries were performed between 2019 and 2023 at its spay and neuter clinic, with 5,034 surgeries performed on cats and 4,012 performed on dogs.

Since 2020, the city has observed the number of requests for surgeries exceed the number that are able to be performed, according to Ottawa Bylaw and Regulatory Services director Roger Chapman. Annually since 2020, about 5,000 surgery request forms were received, but only 40 per cent were fulfilled.

"The Spay/Neuter Clinic’s capacity to perform sterilizations is limited by several factors, including but not limited to surgical and animal holding space, and staff complement, in consideration of staff and patient safety protocols and regulations governing veterinary facilities in Ontario," Chapman said in an email.

"Also notable is the availability of veterinarians and registered veterinary technicians required to operate an animal hospital in Ontario, and even nation-wide, has become very limited in recent years. This has negatively impacted access to pet sterilization services for pet owners."    

Between 2019 and 2023, just over 11,000 cats and dogs combined were admitted to the municipal animal shelter, with the number of stray cats being at least double the number of stray dogs.

As of Wednesday, there were 28 cats and 12 dogs available for adoption on the Ottawa Humane Society's website.

With files from Newstalk 580 CFRA