Come here, kitty, kitty! We're not going to hurt you
Shanghai is awash with stray cats, and one way to reduce their numbers is to reduce their litters. In a creative addition to that campaign, a mobile cat-neutering vehicle started operation in a Pudong subdistrict on Sunday.
Four stray males, caught by residents in the Zhoujiadu Subdistrict, were the first to be handled by the mobile service. The castrations were performed by two volunteer veterinarians at no cost.
“The health conditions of the four are stable,” a vet surnamed Zhang told Shanghai Daily.
After the cats came out of anesthesia, they were taken to the homes of volunteers for recuperation. Then they will be put out for adoption or released back to their old haunts.
A mobile cat-neutering vehicle starts operation in a Pudong subdistrict on Sunday.
The public welfare project is organized by the Shanghai Public Service Foundation of Volunteers and co-sponsored by nine city departments, including the bureaus of public security and civil affairs, and several companies.
Zhou Min, deputy secretary-general of the foundation, said the interagency cooperation is a big step to control the number of stray cats in a city where there are no formal policies dealing with the problem.
“I am happy that we could all work together to address this problem in a scientific and humane way,” said Yu Chunfang, a resident who has been taking care of strays for decades. “Although some may think it cruel to deprive these animals of their reproduction rights, the number of cats has to be controlled.”
Recently, disputes between animal lovers who take care of strays and people who wish they wouldn’t have flared, according to subdistrict officials. Meanwhile, the population of strays continues growing.
A stray cat is neutered by two volunteer veterinarians on the vehicle in Pudong on Sunday.
“We have received many complaints about problems related to the strays, including night-time caterwauling and cat poo everywhere,” said Fei Quanmin, deputy director of Zhoujiadu Subdistrict. “And then there are others who think stray cats keep the rats away.”
Ma Qinghua, head of a public service center of Zhoujiadu, said: “Some people take pity on the strays and feed them, but residents living on ground floors express deep revulsion at their 'kindness' because feeding them just encourages more cats to hang around.”
The subdistrict has 32 residential complexes and estimates that each complex has about 70 to 80 stray cats.
Ma said he is also aware that there’s an illicit market for live kittens, with some dealers selling them as food to Guangdong Province.
“Each kitten worth around 500 yuan (US$77),” he said.
A veterinarian checks a stray cat.
Zhoujiadu officials have tried to address the stray-cat problem in numerous ways over the years. Mostly to no avail.
“Our staff members were nearly hurt by ‘cat people’ when they tried to round them some felines up and transfer them to an adoption center,” Ma said. “Thinking we were going to put the cats to sleep, the protesters called police.”
The police arrived and ascertained what the staff were doing, but the cats had to be released several days later.
“There is no official city agency charged with handling the cats,” Fei said.
The subdistrict finally adopted a policy common in Japan and the US, called “trap, neuter, release.”
According to Animals Asia charity, it’s a good way of controlling the number of stray animals and more humane than euthanasia.
“Some cat lovers do pay for strays to be neutered, but it’s a costly proposition — nearly 1,000 yuan for each procedure,” Ma said.
A volunteer, who caught a stray cat on Saturday night, fills in the application for the castration in Pudong on Sunday.
Private companies and individuals have responded to calls for help. They help finance the operation of the neuter-mobile and aftercare for the cats.
Because of that help, the cost of each neutering procedure has been slashed to about 100 yuan. The foundation has pledged 300,000 yuan as an initial investment in the project and will continue fundraising to keep it going, Zhou said.
On Saturday night, the first “patients” were caught by four local volunteers who regularly feed the cats in the subdistrict.
Zhou said that only males will initially be neutered because spaying females is more complicated and requires more after-surgical care.
Before the operations, vets check the health of the cats.
“Those who are ill won’t be castrated,” said vet volunteer Zhang.
Two vets check the health condition of a stray cat before the operation on the vehicle in Pudong on Sunday.
The neuter-mobile will be activated two to three times a month, dispatched to areas where the need is most pressing.
Compared with an animal hospital, the equipment in the mobile van is more primitive. Zhang said.
“For example, if we had an anesthesia machine on the vehicle, the cats could inhale the gas, which is safer than injection anesthesia,” he said.
Zhou said improvements in the service will be made as it continues operation, and feedback from the public will be taken into account.
“The stray-cat problem exists citywide, not only in the Zhoujiadu,” he said. “We are hoping our approach may be expanded to other areas of Shanghai in the future.”
