CARIBOU, Maine — Teague Park third-graders learned why it is important to always spay or neuter their cats after Norma Milton of Halfway Home Pet Rescue gave a presentation at the Caribou Public Library.
Milton went beyond simply giving a speech and used macaroni to demonstrate just how many cats could result from a failure to spay or neuter a single feline. The students’ eyes were opened when they realized that, with a single piece of macaroni representing one cat, they could end up with far more than an entire box of pasta if they neglected to have their pet sterilized.
While some students spoke up and said they would love to have that many cats, Milton explained how their parents simply could not afford to have such a high number of pets in the house, and that they would eventually have to go to an animal shelter.
“If you get two cats and they decide to raise a family,” Milton said to the students, “with their kittens and the kittens of all of those kittens, you will have how many cats in seven years?”
Milton then held a piece of paper illustrating that, in seven years, 420,000 cats would result from failing to spay or neuter just two, assuming one is male and the other is female.
“Remember that this is just from two cats. There are probably another 5,000 cats out in Caribou, and some of them are having babies. That’s why we work so hard at halfway home to spay and neuter. We want to help these cats have a good life, and we don’t want there to be any little babies out there in the woods or a garbage can with no home.”
Rachel Bourgeois, third grade curriculum leader at Teague Park Elementary School, presented Milton and the Caribou Pet Rescue with a number of donations, many of which were contributed by her students, near the end of the presentation.
Along with spaying and neutering, Milton brought up the importance of letting a cat keep its claws.
“When people tell us they want to declaw their cats,” Milton said as she held up a scratching board, “we tell them to use one of these because they will trim their nails, and will stop them from scratching your furniture. When the vet declaws a cat, he cuts the entire knuckle. How would you feel if somebody cut all the tips of your fingers off?”
Further, any person who decides to adopt from HHPR needs to sign a paper agreeing to not declaw their cat, as it inflicts unnecessary pain.
“We would prefer if people did not adopt young kittens until after Christmas,” said Milton after her presentation. “Really, we would rather hold it over the holiday for you and let it go home when the house is quieter. During Christmas time, cats will lick ribbons and decorations. They will swallow things from the tree. The vets are very busy the week after Christmas. If the adoption committee approves you for a cat, we tell them we would like them to wait until December 27th to bring it home. People are understanding when they know that this is for the cat’s health.”
