Battling the Cat Overpopulation Crisis: The Vital Work of Cats TNR & Rescue

Linda Desjardins, Director of Cats TNR & Rescue discussed the purpose of the organization and how they operate. “We have a group of people that we rescue cats and put them in foster homes and re adopt them out. And also we do the TNR part of it- the Trap, Neuter, Repair. This is for cats that are too wild to adopt..we fix them, vaccinate them, deworm them and then return them to where we caught them so they can live their lives happily hopefully and not reproduce because that’s the big issue with the cat population in Manitoba, actually across Canada. It’s at a crisis point! Every rescue, every shelter is full to the brim and the calls never stop coming in for help.” said Desjardins.

Desjardins mentioned that Cats TNR & Rescue doesn’t only cover Neepawa but also extends to the surrounding areas which are Carberry, Gladstone, McCreary and Minnedosa. When asked about where they house all the cats they rescue until they can get them adopted, she responded “There are a certain amount of foster homes and some of them have more than one, some have one and we’ve got a very small shelter. We had a bigger shelter last year but lost it because the building got sold. It’s a house just north of Neepawa, just on the outskirts of Neepawa and the lady kindly donated it to us because that needs to be occupied for insurance purposes but it’s pretty small so we can’t have so many there. But we could certainly use a bigger one.” The housing requirement is the major need of the organization because with a little shelter space, it won’t be able to house all the cats they rescue, the reason why they will be needing more adoption homes.

There has been a lot of fundraising activities that the organization has been doing for the past few years and it has been well supported by the community including a network of veterinarians that give them discounts for neutering and vaccinations of the cats they rescue.  “I have to say that Neepawa has been supportive and the businesses in Neepawa as far as supporting the rescue, putting out fundraisers for us, that’s been a real great help. We could use more foster homes in Neepawa but we have only a few of those.”  said Desjardins.