Breeding crisis: the plight of animal rescuers during kitten season

Animal activist Ami Stemmet was driving with her husband down the N7 in the northern suburbs of Cape Town when they noticed a dead kitten in the road. Someone had abandoned a box of kittens on an island in the middle of the road. One kitten, the only survivor, was darting in and out of the box.

Stemmet, chief inspector for the South African Animal Welfare Inspectorate Association, says this is not an isolated case. Kittens are found all over the city, even inside ceilings or machinery.

“I’ve come home and found kittens dumped inside my cattery in a box without water, without food,” says Stemmet. “And just a little note saying, ‘I found them in a park. Please assist.’”

This is not the worst possible outcome. Recently, the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) was involved in a case in Ruyterwacht where multiple kittens were cruelly beaten to death after the alleged perpetrator was not able to sell them, says Belinda Abraham, spokesperson for the Cape of Good Hope SPCA.

Stemmet has recently placed 11 kittens in foster care and another six are still in her care. “There are not enough good homes for animals in South Africa,” she says. “Even if we wished there were, there are simply not enough homes.”

The SPCA says the issue of abandoned kittens is particularly bad between September and February, dubbed “kitten season”.

Female cats go on heat during the warmer months when spring is starting, which is why so many kittens are born in summer, says Brenda Kerr, who founded the Feral Cat Project in 2012. Her organisation works in many communities in Cape Town to sterilise cats.

Although there are seasons when a greater number of kittens are born, it is a constant problem, says Kerr.

“Kitten season is actually a fallacy. There are heavy kitten seasons, inundated kitten seasons, which is now, but there are kittens in Cape Town all year round, really,” she explains.

‘Teetering on the brink’

“We are in the grip of a pet overpopulation crisis and, as a result, the animal welfare sector is teetering on the brink,” says Abraham.

In May, the SPCA tried to curb the number of kittens expected this season by sterilising 101 cats in Parkwood and Ottery in a single day. According to Abraham, one single unspayed female cat and her litter can lead to 370,000 kittens in just seven years due to the rapid and exponential rate of feline reproduction.

Spayed females also avoid stressful heat cycles and experience reduced risk of uterine and mammary cancer.

Abraham says the SPCA sterilised 13% more animals this year, which resulted in a 12% decrease in admissions of unwanted strays. Between October and 20 November 2024, the organisation took in 1,702 stray and unwanted cats, whereas in the same period this year it received 1,613 cats.

Economic crisis

However, Stemmet says “this year has been the worst yet” for stray cats.

“My experience, which is normally about 8,000 to 10,000 cats, has shot up to about 25,000 and counting. That’s for November thus far. That’s not even for October.”

Stemmet says the reason for this spike in numbers is that people simply cannot afford to sterilise their cats.

“It’s not that people don’t want to sterilise their pets, but they cannot afford the fricking fees that private vets are asking.

“A private vet charges you anywhere from R1,200 to sometimes as ridiculous as R6,000 to sterilise your pet. The welfare vets are so swamped that they don’t have the capacity to help everybody without getting grants.”

‘A lifetime problem’

After Stemmet found the box of kittens on the N7, she took the survivor, a female, into her home, where she is being bottle-fed.

The kitten is still too young to be tested for diseases, but will undergo the necessary tests at six weeks old.

“A lot of these kittens often test positive for feline Aids or feline leukaemia, either one or the other, or sometimes both, which is becoming a major issue in South Africa,” says Stemmet. She attributes this to the number of unsterilised cats with diseases that transmit them to other cats.

“And, I mean, the diseases are not curable. It’s a lifetime problem for that animal and it’s going to suffer for the rest of its life if it doesn’t get regular medical visits.”

How to help

Abraham says the best way to help remedy the situation is by donating to organisations that do sterilisation outreach work.

“You cannot adopt or rescue your way out of a breeding crisis... It is like trying to empty a dam with a teaspoon while the water keeps rising,” says Abraham.

“Sterilisation is the only intervention that reduces tomorrow’s costs while saving tomorrow’s lives.”

Stemmet suggests finding out about animal welfare programmes in one’s area and contacting them directly to find out how they can be helped. If each person contributed to sterilising one cat, then the problem would be significantly lessened, says Kerr.

“It’s very easy, in this country especially, to turn away and say, ‘Oh well, it’s not my problem’,” says Kerr. “But it’s everybody’s problem!” DM

This story first appeared in our weekly DM168 newspaper, available countrywide for R35.