It’s hard to believe its March already, we have had an exciting year so far, and the year is still young! Our adoptions counselors are busy working with the many adopters who have been visiting us. We have already surpassed 100 adoptions for the year and are well on our way to reaching 200! Of those, ten were cats who were shy or very overstimulated, and 17 were cats with medical issues, including 5 FIV + and 1 FeLV+ and two cats who were admitted with severe orthopedic injuries. We finished 2008 with a total of 646 adoptions, far more than our goal of 600. Hopefully we can continue this record number of adoptions.
While we are excited for all the adoptions we have done, we are aware that there are thousands more animals who will never find their forever home because of the problem of pet overpopulation. We currently offer low cost spay/neuter appointments for low income individuals and for those doing TNR, but are currently limited in the number of procedures we are able to perform. We were able to perform over 50 procedures in February, and are excited to do even more once our new Mac Lean Clinic opens at our Bucktown Location. While the clinic won’t open for business until May, we are having our open house on Saturday, April 4th, from 1:00 – 4:00 p.m. For more information on the open house or the clinic visit our website
In addition to expanding our Spay/Neuter clinic we are also expanding our TNR and Behavior Counseling departments to better educate the public. Many people still are unaware of benefits of Trap-Neuter-Return or the difference between feral and stray cats, which is where our TNR counselors step in. They will provide basic information about TNR such as how to trap, why TNR, and how to talk to your neighbors. They also offer several free trapping seminars each month. Our behavior counselors will help individuals figure out the source of their cat’s unusual behavior, whether the cat was adopted from Tree House or not. Behavior issues, especially litter box related, are the main reasons cats are relinquished to shelters each year; so many of these relinquishments could be avoided if individuals had the correct information about cat behavior, which is what we aim to provide. Our hope is that by better educating individuals we will be able to reduce the number of cats admitted to shelters and thus the number euthanizied each year.
One of the best ways we can spread the messsage of proper and responsible animal care is by getting our name out there. We are doing that by involving ourselves in a number of events throughout the comming year. Our next event will be Bingo Night at Hamburger Mary's 5400 N. Clark from 8-10pm. You can get more information visit our events page. Also be sure to visit us at the the Chicagoland Family Pet Expo at the Arlington Racecourse, March 20-22.
We are also excited to announce our 4th Annual Stray Cat Strut will be held Saturday, May 30 from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. The walk starts at our Bucktown location and finishes at our Uptown location, where festivities will be taking place. The Stray Cat Strut would be one great way to prep yourself for running the Chicago Marathon, on October 11, as a member of Team Tree House.
We will have more information about Team Tree House soon, if you are interested in learning more about this exciting new way to help Tree House be sure to visit our Team Tree House website.