Emergency re-homing of cats

[Cozytoesandtoast00]

Hi
I was wondering if someone could help.
My family member is having a mental health crisis. She has also gone into hospital for major surgery.
She has four cats and was previously unable to train the cats and so they were toileting all over the house.
She will now not be able to clean up after them at all as she cannot bend for many weeks.
They need to be re-homed urgently. I have contacted Cats Protection and they are full and unable to suggest anything else.
Does anyone have any solutions? I would be very grateful.
Thank you.

If you post your area people may be able to recommend smaller independent cat rescues.

You don't have to train a cat to go in the litter box. That's where they naturally want to pee. Although if they've got into bad habits of using the whole house as a litterbox then it can be hard to get them out of that habit. We had a cat who'd pee and poop on the floor (right next to her clean litter box) and she only stopped when we moved house.

Can you take them in temporarily until somewhere can be found? Though 4 cats with behavioural problems are not going to be easy to re-home.

Thank you for your responses. I don't want to share my location on here but thanks for the suggestion.
After digging deeper it seems to be that two of the cats are not neutered and so cannot be let out.
I think I will recommend getting this done so they can go outside for some of the time. Hopefully this may encourage them to toilet outside?

Try your local small indie cat rescues for advice, they might be able to link you with vets that offer neutering for a smaller fee and with cat fostering services as an alternative to rehoming.

Have a similar situation here with an elderly neighbour no longer able to care for hers. They are in the waiting list at 4 different rescues but none have space. It’s been 8 weeks and situation is desperate. Such a sad (& frustrating) situation. Only advice I could get is get them on as many different waiting lists as possible and hope!

There's a website called Catchat which will give you all the rescues in your area.
All rescues have waiting lists at present, it's a nightmare. However, they do tend to prioritise the more urgent cases.

There is a charity called The Cinnamon Trust who help the sick and elderly with precisely this. I'm not sure what their T&C are but I came across them when I worked in welfare a few years ago.

Can they get a petsitter to visit daily to do litter cleanups etc until your relative can mobilise?

Neutering should help with marking etc so if you can get that done that would be beneficial (& help if the situation becomes more longterm and rehoming is your only option).

Agree: pet-sitter in the short term and neutering so cats can go out.

Whether rehoming is best for all in the end will need to be considered once your relative is in a better place.

They’re likely to be toileting all over because they’re stressed - 4 cats is a lot, not all get on, if they don’t go out their ‘territory’ is very small and that leads to behaviour issues like this. Also, did your family member provide enough litter boxes (1 per cat minimum) and clean them every day? If they’re struggling with their mental health and physical health I’d imagine they probably didn’t.

Once they’re in the habit of marking, the clean up needs to be really thorough with a cleaner that neutralises the enzymes that stop them scenting where they’ve marked before. If this has been going on a while then it’s probably not easy to fix in that house.

If you could rehome even a couple of them, and then make sure there’s clean trays and access to outside then she might find the remaining cats are less stressed and will resume normal toilet habits. But litter trays will still need doing so if she can’t bend to clean up, the self-cleaning ones are expensive but useful.

Probably not going to be popular for saying this but I would have the PTS. It's going to be highly distressing taking them from their home to a shelter and being split up. I can't see anyone taking on 4 cats that piss everywhere.

The RSPCA May be able to advise:

https://www.rspca.org.uk/adviceandwelfare/pets/unwantedpets

Quite right: extremely unpopular.

What a hateful and disgusting suggestion. I hope you are a keyboard warrior and don't have any power over real cats.

There’s a sanctuary in Scotland called willows it’s in Aberdeenshire. It takes cats that can’t be rehomed elsewhere such as if they aren’t toilet trained or have behaviour issues or feral.

there might be one like that near you. Or you could try them

If your family member is on benefits some vets do a £10 neutering scheme through Cat's Protection.

Chalfont animal sanctuary may be able to help.

TELEPHONE: 01883 3429844_
EMAIL: [email protected]m_
Visitors are welcome - but by appointment only please.
The Chalet, Chaldon Animal Sanctuary, Birchwood Lane, Chaldon, Surrey, CR3 5DQ

Chaldon ^ autocorrect!

Could you not tell us a rough idea of where the cats are spicy as south east, Scotland etc

Apologies for the late reply. And thank you so much for all of your advice.
My family member has decided she wants to keep them ( with support of a friend for now)
I have advised her to get them neutered and give them more outdoor time.
It's out of my hands now.