Rememeber the 'mumsnet kittens' who were rescued from that wheelie bin....

[RightsaidFreud]

I can't quite remember where the thread was, I think it was in chat, but they got rescued by a fellow mumsnetter and taken to the celia hammond trust. Well, here's a pic of them, from the celia hammond fb page.

www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=623576957653167&set=a.197411173603083.51821.154255827918618&type=1&theater

I wondered what had happened to them.

Have they and Mum all got homes lined up do you know?

It says they are being fostered at the moment and are all looking for homes in pairs. They are so cute!

Here's the thread.

\link{http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/1734842-URGENT-KITTEN-HELP-NEEDED?msgid=38534396#38534396\Mumsnet kittens}

Celia Hammond are incredibly particular about homing their kittens. Far more so than other cat sanctuaries. They won't let you have a kitten if you live anywhere near a main road, and sometimes for other reasons such as young children, other pets, working hours etc. I know several lovely, responsible people who have been refused cats, which seems crazy when they have so many desperately needing homes. Lets hope this mum and kittens find a home soon!

Oh bless. Thanks for sharing that.

awww they are cute

bedhog all cat rescues have to have rules for adoption as a kitten or cat going to the wrong for them house will usually result in unhappy owners, an unhappy cat and most times means the cat ends up back in rescue, which is not good for cat or rescue or owners who then feel guilty because they had to return the cat or kitten, and keeps the huge waiting lists long because the returned cat needs a pen , and main roads kill , young children can be perfectly capable of being gentle with a kitten but some are not, so there are myriad reasons why someone ata rescue is not allowed to adopt a kitten

Wow they look great. Beautiful :)

bedhog: yes we are careful when we rehome kittens as we don't want to put them in danger or for them to be returned to us, but there are no hard and fast rules. We do home to families with young children, but it depends what the children are like. As I once had to collect a dead kitten that had been killed by a young child I can vouch that this isn't being overly cautious. And we also home to families with dogs and and other animals, but it depends on the individual dogs. Likewise homes near main roads are necessarily ruled out either. If it's a row of terraces with adjoining, safe gardens at the back and not much chance of the cat finding it's way to the busy road at the front, then that's fine.

And in nearly all the cases where we say that kittens or a particular cat wouldn't be suitable from someone, we can nearly always suggest other cats that would be fine for their situation.

I absolutely agree it is necessary to be very careful when homing young kittens in particular, and I know you home to young families as you allowed us to have a cat! However I have since had several conversations with people whose homes were refused and were told reasons such as 'your child is under 10' and 'you are married and in your late twenties so will probably have babies sometime soon'. These people were all able to go to Cat Call or the RSPCA or other local cat rescue centres and get the cats or kittens they wanted and give them loving homes.

So my point was just that you do great work for the feline population, but, from what I've heard from numerous unrelated people, you are more picky with your homes than most of the other sanctuaries.

Bedfrog: we would never, never refuse cats or kittens for the reasons you gave above: 'you might want babies soon' - ridiculous. Either they haven't actually understood the real reasons or they are, to be kind, embellishing the truth.

I read the Mumsnet kittens thread with great anticipation and relief at their ultimate rescue. CHAT should be applauded for the great work they did that night. I am also sure that they have been taking great care of the kittens and will find them a good homes.

However, I have to agree with Bedhog that they are more picky than other rescue organizations about who they home kittens with. I had a rather unpleasant home visit from them and have also heard stories similar to Bedhog's since.

Maybe it is fortunate that they are in a position to be so discriminating rather than trying to get rid of unwanted cats and kittens anyway possible.

So glad I dot live n Lewisham! How adorable are they, can remeber the thread.

A question though, there are 5 kittens, how are they rehomed in pairs?

I'm guessing Mom and one of the kits?

i was on that thead. jeepers it was quite exciting... and blooming awesome! mumsnet is amazing sometimes.

those kittens are so so adorable. they look really happy too

wish dh and i could get a cat, but we rent so its not possible

Yes Cozie - we always home Mum with at least one kitten. If we have an even number of kittens then we either try to home Mum with two, or we pair one kitten up with a kitten of a similar age from another litter of even numbers.

And California and Bedhog: we are most certainly not in a position where we can afford to be really picky. We are inundated with unwanted cats and kittens to the point where things are really desperate. We do of course want to find our kittens homes and would have to have a really good reason to turn homes down - and certainly not for those reasons given above. Maybe we have one 'rogue' rehomer - but I doubt it. Sometimes people are set on having kittens when they really wouldn't be suitable and even though we suggest a cat a few months older they refuse. Without knowing each individual situation I can't really comment. All I can say is that I'm sorry if you, Calfornia, had an unpleasant home check, and that we are desperate to find homes and certainly don't have any silly rules in place that rule out good homes.

When I went to my local cats protection, i saw first hand what thecatneuterer is referring to with people refusing older cats and its really sad.

A woman was in front of me with her son who was running about the small reception area and asked the woman on the front desk if they had any grey tabby kittens in. she proclaimed very loudly that 'little jonny simply must have a grey tabby as its the only colour he wants and it MUST be a kitten'. The cp lady very polity said that they didn't have any grey tabbys, and they never know what colour kittens they going to have on a day to day basis. She suggested that the lady and her son take a walk around to see the older cats and kittens that they had, and see if they saw a cat/kitten they would like to consider homing. The woman and her son got very shirty with the poor receptionist and the woman bungled her son out of there with him moaning 'but mummy I WANT A GREY KITTEN'.

Quite frankly, I was horrified. I know some people have a preference on which colour cat they might get, but it's not something ive ever really thought of. I got half way down the corridor of the older cat wing of the cp and started blubing because i wanted to take them all home. It makes me sad to think that if people want cat so much, why would they refuse to take a slightly older cat, if a having a kitten perhaps isnt suitable for whatever reason.

Personally, I'd take a note of that woman's name and tell the other homers 'Not with a bargepole - for any cat'.

What I found, through personal experience (we weren't allowed kittens) and talking to friends (thecatneuterer please take this as constructive criticism because I do have a lot of respect for CHAT) is that CHAT base their homing decisions on the situation - the busyness of the road, the age of the children etc., and don't take into account the behaviour of potential cat owners, whereas other sanctuaries do. Some people let their cats roam all day and night a couple of weeks after they bring them home, others will very carefully settle their cats in over several months before allowing access little by little to the outside world, taking the trouble to use the 'Pavlov's Dog' method to make the cat wary of traffic and any other relevant dangers, and even then only allow cats out for short periods while they are at home. It's very disheartening if you are the latter type of owner to be turned down because it has been assumed that you might be the former. I know it is hard to tell for sure in a 30 minute home check but surely a home that is even 80% perfect is preferable to months and months in a pen, taking up space that is so desperately needed by other cats in terrible situations. You are London based so most of your potential homers aren't going to live in quiet cul-de-sacs in the middle of nowhere in adult only homes where someone is in all day. The cats and kittens need the best homes available from what's on offer, and sometimes that will involve compromise. It would be better, if you are serious about wanting to find more homes, to say to people 'We would prefer you to have an older cat, but if you really want kittens, this is what you MUST do to make sure they are safe and happy......are you prepared to do that?' rather than 'Your road is quite busy and you have toddlers so we won't let you have kittens', because people will be offended and go elsewhere as my friends and California's friends have shown.

I have just seen this thread and felt I had to add my experience of adopting 3 young cats from CHAT Lewisham - 2 siblings, then later a 2nd cat, so two sets of procedures so to speak.

I live close to a busy main road, I live in a working class, non affluent area and have up to 6, yes 6 children, all but one aged 0-5 in my home on a daily basis - I work as a childminder.

Lesley, the rehoming lady came out to see me on a day I was working, so she could see the set up and match us with appropriate cats. Before she even rang my doorbell, unbeknowns to me (until she told me in discussion) she had walked around the neighbourhood and looked at the busy road, checked the buildings nearby (we have offices and industrial units nearby) . She then came in, and after a good chat about our wishes and what we could offer a CHAT cat, I showed her around my home. We talked about if the cats had escape routes from over zealous toddlers, and how to introduce them to the garden space.

Lesley and I then sat back down and she told me that she thought an all black cat would not be suited to our home (my daughter had asked for one as she heard they we often overlooked) as if they did get out, they were more likely to be run over on busy road. We agreed cats 6months + would suit us as they would be more confident around the children. We also agreed the cats would only be let outdoors via the back garden which, as catneuterer described, meant they had back to back gardens to play in.

At no time did I feel patronised or limited by this discussion. It was very friendly and I was pleased that we were getting cats at all. It was a mutually positive exchange. Lesley knew her cats and I knew our household

I am surprised that people think CHAT are picky, as I had prior to this exchange, experienced resistance to adoption of cats to those with children from two large ,local animal charities, and this experience was repeated by a friend a year later.

I have nothing but praise for the work they do, One of my original cats became unwell and died suddenly, there was speculation about inherited problems and CHAT went out of their way to check this out, and take extra care of my other cat, when he went for a routine procedure, as they knew I was concerned. They were also very supportive when my other cat went missing, earlier this year.

Thanks for that dobby. All I can say is that everyone tries their best. It's not an exact science and no one can be sure that they've got everything exactly right all the time. However everyone tries to make the best decisions in each individual circumstance with the well-being of the cats in mind.

Thank you Dobby and thecatneuterer.
A home visit is not just about assessing whether we consider that we should place a cat with someone or not but is also about trying to match cats or kittens to their new home, taking time to do this carefully helps ensure the chances of a good match and the cat settling in well. Our rescued cats come in a range of temperaments from adult feral cats, feral kittens that with patience can be tamed through a wide range of domestic cat temperaments to lovely friendly confident cats and kittens. All are homeable but have different requirements of their new home in order to settle well and be happy.

At CHAT we do consider ourselves to be child friendly, we do home to families with babies and young children and to couples who will have children in future. Most of our homing staff and volunteers have children and cats ourselves and we are fully aware of the positive benefits of children growing up with cats. Looking back years ago several other local animal charities had a policy of not homing to children under 5 when we were. The idea that we don't home to families with children is simply incorrect.

With regard to busy roads we look at access onto the road. Sadly cats and kittens do get run over very easily and having rescued our cats we want them to have the best chance of long and happy lives. In London many streets are terraced with gardens backing onto gardens which creates a perfect safe area for cats to enjoy. A road can be busy at the front but if the cats are kept at the back and can't reach the front thats fine. If a road is busier than we would like we will often suggest 'streetwise' adult cats. If we rescue cats from living near busy roads and they have survived there then hopefully they will have some road sense. Kittens and young cats are the highest risk with cars as they tend to just dash out in the road and lack caution. Our veterinary clinic treats on a daily basis cats that have been horribly injured in road accidents, so we get to see first hand the damage a car can inflict if the cat is not indeed killed.

It is hard to comment specifically on individual cases but we do consider each offer of a home individually and are not looking for reasons to say no, we need homes for our many rescued cats.

We have an Open Day at Lewisham Branch today 233-235, Lewisham Way SE4 1UY 1p.m - 5p.m so if anyones interested in adopting a cat or two or two kittens or a mum and a kitten do pop along to meet us and some of our cats.

I would have loved to have gone to the open day, just to catch up with and support you-but I suspect I may have left with another cat, which DH would not have been to happy about .
BTW, after posting my last message, I went on to Amazon. You should be getting some cat toys at Lewisham soon