Local cat rescue struggling to make ends meet
The Feline Café and Rescue Foundation in Hintonburg needs the community’s help to meet the financial demands for their rescue cats and kittens.
The café posted to social media this month saying “To put everything into one sentence; we are struggling.”
Katherine Clements runs the Feline Café’s Rescue Foundation and says, “These past few months have been especially hard... Really hard to keep going and get the vet care for these little ones.”
Clements says the pandemic has greatly impacted both the café and the foundation. “March 2020 hit and we lost everything,” The café was forced to shut down temporarily, which resulted in no one visiting the cats, and revenue plummeted. Fundraising efforts were also canceled.
But the need to rescue cats continued. There was also an increase in cats that were surrendered during the pandemic from owners no longer able to care for their pets.
“We have been pushing it... it has always been at the back of our mind—will we survive? We have no idea,” says Clements.
The café had to pivot during the pandemic, starting a takeout grocery and online store. Visitors are allowed to now visit the cats, but it is under provincial restrictions. The have tried to do fundraising online as well as a take-away, but that has not been enough.
In the past few months, the rescue took in three pregnant cats, who gave birth to 14 kittens, and nine other adults. Some required emergency vet care.
The rescue cats include mother Dash, who was taken in this winter and gave birth to premature kittens.
Clements says, "If we hadn’t taken her on they would have all perished because it was way too cold for her to have kitten at that time.”
She says it is expensive to cover the vet needs for the kittens. “Typically, depending on the cat their vet bill alone, not food or anything else, will be about $600 to a $1000 each.”
Clements says, “The rescue will not survive without the café, the café will not survive without the rescue.”
To help the rescue foundation you can visit https://felinecafeottawa.com/pages/support
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Video shows suspect setting Toronto-area barbershop on fire
Video of a suspect lighting a Richmond Hill barbershop on fire earlier this week has been released by police.
'I have the will to live': N.B. woman needs double lung transplant
A New Brunswick woman suffering from sarcoidosis, a disease that limits your lung capacity, is in need of a double lung transplant.
The kids from 'Mrs. Doubtfire are all SUPER grown up now, and we're not OK
The adorable trio of child actors from the 1993 classic comedy 'Mrs. Doubtfire,' which starred the late and great Robin Williams, are all grown up and looking back on their seminal time together.
Police officer hit by driver of fleeing vehicle in Toronto
York Regional Police say they are continuing to search for a suspect in an auto theft investigation who was captured on video running over a police officer in Toronto last month.
Boeing is on the verge of launching astronauts aboard new capsule, the newest entry to space travel
It’s the first flight of Boeing’s Starliner capsule with a crew on board, a pair of NASA pilots who will check out the spacecraft during the test drive and a weeklong stay at the space station.
Britney Spears 'home and safe' after paramedics responded to an incident at the Chateau Marmont, source tells CNN
A source close to singer Britney Spears tells CNN that the pop star is 'home and safe' after she had a 'major fight' with her boyfriend on Wednesday night at the Chateau Marmont in West Hollywood.
Suter scores late goal, clinches series for Canucks
Pius Suter scored with 1:39 left and the Vancouver Canucks advanced to the second round of the NHL playoffs with a 1-0 victory over the Nashville Predators on Friday night in Game 6.
A Chinese driver is praised for helping reduce casualties in a highway collapse that killed 48
A Chinese truck driver was praised in local media Saturday for parking his vehicle across a highway and preventing more cars from tumbling down a slope after a section of the road in the country's mountainous south collapsed and killed at least 48 people.
TD worst-case scenario more likely after drug money laundering allegations: analyst
TD Bank Group could be hit with more severe penalties than previously expected, says a banking analyst after a report that the investigation it faces in the U.S. is tied to laundering illicit fentanyl profits.