The Community Cats Podcast

This episode is sponsored in part by Doobert.com. Writer, curator, and design and material culture historian Sarah Archer speaks with Stacy about how her love of her rescue cats led her to her newest project. Sarah is a senior curator at Philadelphia Art Alliance, a contributor to Hyperallergic and many other publications, and has worked with organizations such as Project Meow and Morris Animal Refuge in Philadelphia, PA. After a cameo by Sarah’s kitten Toast, Stacy and Sarah discuss Sarah’s most recent project, a book called Catland: the Soft Power of Cat Culture in Japan which explores the unique relationship between humans and cats in Japan. Japan has a rich history of cats in arts and crafts, and today images of cats proliferate all parts of Japanese culture. Because of small apartments in big cities, it’s less common for Japanese people to adopt cats, which leads to a more collective style of caring for community cats. Their discussion also touches on overpopulation of cats in Japan, TNR efforts, and the

This episode is sponsored in part by Doobert.com, and KittySift. Author of Hobo Finds a Home and Huck and Finn, Bookstore Cats and independent bookstore owner Kevin Coolidge is featured in this episode. The tradition of library and bookstore cats goes back to the Library of Alexandria and Kevin is keeping up the tradition with his two bookstore cats Huck and Finn, who have been featured in Cole and Marmalade’s blog and in Bookstore Catsby Brandon Schultz. Stacy and Kevin talk about how Huck and Finn, and previously a cat named Hobo, found their home in the bookstore and became the stars of Kevin’s children’s books. You can buy the books at Kevin’s website or from his bookstore From My Shelf. If you can’t make it up to Wellsboro, PA for a visit, Huck and Finn can be found online on their Facebook page.

In this special episode, we celebrate National Cat Day by talking with Pam Johnson-Bennett, Certified Cat Behavior Consultant and best-selling author. Pam and Stacy discuss how Pam started her career and why we need to "think like a cat," as well as her latest project with ARM & HAMMER Cat Litter's "Purrfectly Impurrfect" campaign. The campaign is kicking off on National Cat Day to shed light on cats who may be passed by for adoption because of their age, appearance, or misunderstood personality. From October 29–November 30, anyone can nominate a "purrfectly impurrfect" shelter cat.   Pam and two other cat experts will be selecting three winners, and each winning shelter will receive $10,000 from ARM & HAMMER Cat LItter, plus Pam's counseling services. Pam tells us not to wait to nominate a purrfectly impurrfect cat, as the first 100 nominations will receive $100 worth of ARM & HAMMER Cat Litter! And she also reminds us that if you can't adopt, you can still help spread the word. When it comes to

This episode is sponsored in part by Doobert.com, and Heaven Can Wait. Kathleen O’Malley is a longtime practitioner and educator of TNR. She has worked for the Hudson County Animal League, the ASPCA, the Mayor’s Alliance for New York City Animals, and Bideawee Feral Cat Initiative (FCI). In this episode Stacy and Kathleen discuss what to do if you see a stray cat, the many ways you can help with TNR, and the challenges facing those assisting community cats. Kathleen shares more about programs provided by Bideawee FCI, including education and outreach around TNR and caring for colonies, as well as support for certified TNR caretakers and the general public to connect with resources, services, and each other. To find out more, you can email info@nycferalcat.org or visit Bideawee’s website or the NYC Feral Cat Initiative. 

This episode is sponsored in part by Doobert.com, Heaven Can Wait, and C5. This week Stacy talks to Meagan King, who has worked in pit bull rescues, animal shelters, and the pet service industry for more than eight years. She is interested in animal fear, aggression, and behavior and has worked with the SPCA of Texas as the Dallas behavior coordinator. She is a champion of fear-free cat-handling techniques. She currently works in Houston helping to identify community cat candidates in the shelter environment, as well as educating staff and the community on fear-free techniques. Meagan and Stacy discuss dealing with cats with behavior problems in shelters and how to identify the best placement for a particular cat. They also talk about Harris County’s partnership with Best Friends Animal Society to create a robust TNVR, SNR (shelter, neuter, return), and community cat program. They also touch on the effects of COVID-19 on fostering, adoption, and spay and neuter. To learn more go to the Harris County Pets webs

This episode is sponsored in part by Doobert.com, Boulder Holistic Vet, and C5. Kathy Black, an all-breed judge from the Cat Fanciers’ Association (CFA) for the past 19 years, joins Stacy in this episode. Kathy has bred and shown cats for 30 years, and she also chairs the CFA’s Companion Cat World (CCW), a program that celebrates rescued and non-pedigreed cats around the world. Kathy shares a bit of the CFA’s history with Stacy, and explains that even though the CFA is “mostly a registry of pedigreed cats, we have always been there to enhance the well-being of all cats and promote education, responsible cat ownership, and proper care for millions of cats worldwide.” CFA’s goal is to reach out to the cat people out there who have never heard of them and let them know who they are, what they stand for, and what they work for. Stacy and Kathy go on to discuss the CFA’s thoughts on cat overpopulation issues around the world, including how they promote spay/neuter while also working to protect and preserve breeds.

This episode is sponsored in part by Doobert.com, Boulder Holistic Vet, and Kitty Sift. In this episode, Stacy chats with Sarah Moore, the clinic manager for the Animal Protective League (APL) of Springfield Illinois’s spay/neuter clinic, and with Dr. Teri Kidd, the clinic’s veterinarian.  They discuss how Dr. Kidd got into high-quality, high-volume spay/neuter and TNR, and how things have changed in the city, numbers-wise, since the clinic opened in 2006.   Stacy, Sarah, and Dr. Kidd also discuss the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on their clinic and how they were able to remain open for all but one day during the spring 2020 outbreak. They also talk about the pandemic’s impact on the shelter and intake numbers and Dr. Kidd offers some thoughts regarding how leaders might better handle veterinary services in the event of another outbreak or similar situation.   To learn more about the word APL does, visit their website, or check them out on social media. For more tips on advocating for veterinary service

This episode is sponsored in part by Doobert.com's FosterSpace, Boulder Holistic Vet, and Community Cat Coalition of Clark County. In this episode, Stacy chats with Jennifer Barnes, a US Marine Corps veteran who has been colony feeding and trapping cats for TNR for over five years in New Jersey. Known online as “The Trap Queen,” Jennifer largely uses her own money to fund her TNR, and she doesn’t drive—but she still gets the job done. She and Stacy discuss how she became involved in rescue and, eventually, TNR, and Jennifer shares the story of how she found the strength to keep trapping after having to euthanize the first cat she ever trapped. Jennifer also talks with Stacy about the lack of diversity in animal welfare, and how, as a Black woman, her early experiences with the animal welfare industry made her consider quitting. Though she traps independently, she has since connected up with a nonprofit organization that has a Black CEO, a fact that has made her feel more at ease and like she belongs in animal

This episode is sponsored in part by Doobert.com’s FosterSpace, Boulder Holistic Vet, and Heaven Can Wait Animal Society. Sarah Dunsmore of CDE Animal Cages, previously featured on CCP Episode 302, joins Stacy to talk about catios, which CDE (a 2020 Online Kitten Conference sponsor) produces in all shapes and sizes for all different applications. Stacy and Sarah discuss the benefits of catios, and why a catio is preferable to letting a cat outdoors. CDE works with each individual to design a custom catio that works for their location and the needs of both the owner and the cats. They have many different options and price points, and all of their catios can be broken down for re-assembly at a new location if needed. The catio components are designed to last for many decades and are completely cleanable. To learn more, Sarah encourages you to look at what other people are doing, perhaps through a virtual catio tour, and to visit the catio page at the CDE Animal Cages website.

This episode is sponsored in part by Doobert.com’s FosterSpace, C5, and The American Association of Feline Practitioners. In this episode, Stacy chats with Holly Ganz, Ph.D., a micro-ecologist who studies how microbes and mammals interact, with a specific interest in the role that the gut microbiome plays in gastrointestinal (GI) conditions in cats and dogs. In 2015, Holly founded Animal Biome to create better diagnostics and therapeutics for cats and dogs with GI conditions. She and Stacy discuss how she became interested in this field, and the Kitty Biome Kickstarter that began the whole thing. They review what the term gut microbiome means and how all this relates to animal welfare work. Today, Animal Biome offers microbiome testing and fecal transplant capsules for dogs and cats that can be given at home. Holly explains what a fecal transplant is, how it works, and what conditions it can be helpful for, and she discusses what’s ahead for Animal Biome. To learn more, visit the Animal Biome website, where y

This episode is sponsored in part by Doobert.com's FosterSpace, Heaven Can Wait, and The American Association of Feline Practitioners. In this episode, Stacy catches up with Keith Williams of the Community Cat Coalition of Clark County (C5), based in Las Vegas, Nevada. Keith was featured previously on CCP Episode 297, ad in a CCP Trapper Tips & Trips blog post. Stacy and Keith review C5’s mission and background, and they discuss how the coronavirus pandemic has affected their work. They talk about how they’re bouncing back from that, and why it’s so important for C5 that they focus solely on TNR. “Sterilization, spay/neuter is the way out of this,” Keith tells Stacy. “It truly is the only way out of this.” Keith also tells Stacy about their trapper training protocols, and about how he believes more resources must be directed toward spay/neuter. To learn more about C5 and the work they do, visit their website.

Anna Raines, currently a community cat program manager at Best Friends Animal Society, has been involved in animal welfare for about 10 years. She started her career as a wildlife rehabilitator, where she learned about complaint mitigation and the importance of spreading the message of coexistence. From there, she became an ACO, a role in which she learned about TNR and community cats. After taking over the Best Friends community cat program in Cobb County, Georgia, Anna helped bring the county’s save rate for cats from 62% to 94%. Anna talks with Stacy about how she started out vehemently opposed to TNR and RTF after being introduced to it through her wildlife rehab work. “I was being fed a very different narrative on outdoor cats,” she told Stacy, than the one she later encountered as an ACO. Now a passionate advocate for TNR and RTF, Anna is working to help change the ordinances in her area to make TNR and other community cat programs legal. To learn more about the work Anna is doing, you can email her dir

Anne Beall, CEO and founder of Beall Research, a strategic market research firm in Chicago, IL, is also an animal advocate who has written extensively about the human-animal bond. In this episode, she chats with Stacy about her most recent book, Heroic, Helpful and Caring Cats: Felines Who Make a Difference, and about how she came to be so passionate about cats after becoming the caretaker for several community cats. Anne and Stacy discuss why Anne decided to write her first book about cats, Community Cats: A Journey into the World of Feral Cats. “I think that they have a tremendous contribution that they make to the communities that they’re in,” Anne tells Stacy, “and I wanted to give them a voice.” Anne also shares with Stacy the details of some research her firm did on TNR and people’s perceptions of it and support for it. They talk about the importance of spreading the word about TNR. “[TNR programs] suffer for lack of awareness and for a lack of information,” Anne says, “but most people are very in favor

Stacy chats with Julie Jacobson of Spay Tennessee, who is also the grants coordinator for CCP’s Community Cats Grants program. Julie, a frequent CCP guest (check out Episodes 2, 92, and 268, talks about how great this year’s grant program had been going—until the coronavirus hit. Julie and Stacy explain how the Community Cats Grants work: They are strictly for spay/neuter of community cats, and they are matching $1,000 grants that a group can earn by raising money through a new fundraising idea that they’ve never tried before. Julie tells listeners that there is a CCP webinar they can view about the grant application process, and she gives some helpful tips about live release rates, and also about Guidestar. Stacy and Julie go on to discuss the effects that the COVID-19 pandemic has had on animal transport programs, and on spay/neuter, especially in rural areas like the ones Spay Tennessee services. All in all, Julie has deep worries about the effect of many months without spay/neuter. “Here in Tennessee,” s

Bonney Brown (CCP Episode 30 and Episode 181) and Diane Blankenburg, the president, and the CEO, respectively, of Humane Network, join Stacy to talk about the process of leadership recruitment in animal welfare. Humane Network assists organizations with this process and Bonney and Diane talk a bit about their process for going about a search and ways they can help throughout the process, depending on what their client needs.   Stacy goes on to discuss with Bonney and Diane the best kind of interview questions to use in order to really get at people’s core competencies, how to determine an appropriate salary range, and they discuss why the “lifespan” for executive directors and directors of development seems to be so short in animal welfare. Bonney and Diane also offer some advice for organizations that may not have paid staff but are still looking to recruit new leadership.   For more information, visit the Humane Network website, or email them at info@humanenetwork.org.

In this episode, Stacy chats with Carrie Gillaspie, a television and podcast host from rural central Wisconsin with a huge passion for helping animals. Last year, Carrie began noticing larger than normal numbers of barn and community cats in her area, and hearing complaints from the farms around her, that the cat numbers were out of control. Taking matters into her own hands, Carrie convinced a local group, The Fix Is In, to bring their mobile clinic to her neighborhood—and she raised the funds to make the surgeries totally free of charge to those bringing cats. That event is now being used as a prototype for six other events planned for this spring and summer. Stacy and Carrie discuss Carrie’s fundraising strategy for the event, as well as the logistics of the surgery day. They talk about what Carrie feels the impact will be on the local community, and how she is now spearheading The Fix Is In’s effort to get this model out in other communities. The campaign is called The Year of the Cat 2020, with a goal of

In this information-packed episode, Stacy sits down with Dr. Bob Weedon, a retired veterinarian who is still going strong as a volunteer at the TLC PetSnip low-cost clinic in Lakeland, FL, a board member of the Alliance for Contraception in Cats & Dogs (ACC&D), and in other volunteer posts. Bob worked in private practice and also spent many years teaching in the shelter medicine program at the University of Illinois, including teaching high-quality high-volume spay/neuter techniques to veterinary students. He also holds a Master’s degree in public health. Along the way, he also became involved in TNR. “I just recognized there was such a need,” he says, “and that I had the tools that… could address that need.” Stacy and Bob discuss why the “V” in trap-neuter-vaccinate-return (TNVR) is so crucial, both for the cats and for proving the value of TNVR programs to community leaders and officials. He discusses the concept of herd immunity in relation to rabies, and also goes into great detail about cats and

In this episode, Stacy sits down with Sterling Davis again (she talked with him before in CCP Episode 243) to catch up on what he’s been doing for the last couple of years. Sterling is still living up to his nickname of Trap King, doing lots of TNR in Atlanta—but he has also been busy doing educational events and shows. He has been working with scout troops—and hoping to get a TNR badge in place—and he has been touching on the issue of diversity in rescue. He shares some tips with Stacy on dealing with “feral humans,” as well as some trapping tips. Stacy and Sterling discuss fundraising, and the Patreon page Sterling has set up to assist him with raising funds for his one-man operation. Sterling likes the platform because it allows him to give a little something back to his followers in return for their support, and the proceeds have helped him out tremendously with traps, gas, and TNR surgeries. Sterling is available to travel for speaking engagements and he tells Stacy that his goal has been to make cat res

In this episode, Stacy sits down with Ashley Shoults, a principal w/ Animal Arts, an architecture firm in Boulder, Colorado that specializes exclusively in the design of animal care facilities, including animal shelters, veterinary facilities, and pet boarding facilities. Ashley is currently working on the design of a new facility for PAWS Seattle and she recently co-authored a book covering all aspects of animal care design, Practical Guide to Veterinary Hospital Design. Stacy and Ashley talk about the importance of design in every aspect of animal care, from feral cat feeding stations to the spaces we care for our cats in. As Ashley puts it, “We need to constantly be thinking about how the people use the space, and how the animals use the space and how do we make it an environment that the animals will also thrive in.” They go on to discuss how community cats should be accounted for in design and planning, which Ashley sees as a big area for opportunity and growth in our shelters in terms of how we house co

In this episode, Stacy chats with Steven Morelli, CEO and founder of Waggle, a new—and very different—crowdfunding platform to help pet owners and shelters/rescues raise money for animals in need of urgent veterinary care. Steven, who has a background in finance and data analytics, found himself increasingly angry over the way various crowdfunding platforms operate. Frustrated, he decided to start Waggle to connect people who find themselves considering surrendering or euthanizing their beloved pets because they can’t afford needed veterinary care with people who want to help. Waggle differs from other platforms in that rather than funds going to the person or group raising money, they go directly to veterinarians. Waggle has a network of participating veterinarians, but they will send funds to any veterinarian an individual or group is working with. Stacy and Steven go on to discuss matching funds and how vet clinics and shelters/rescues can establish their own funds, as well as how fees and tax deductibilit