Pets at Home teaming up with cat charities to 'sell' cats?

[Sparklingbrook]

Here Daily mail link-sorry.

This sounds awful, so assume the DM has got it's facts wrong. How on earth will it work?

I think I know what you are saying Kif, and being a volunteer for a cat charity that is interesting.

Our charity does 'rehoming shows' every so so often in an attempt to get the cats out there. There's no shelter as suich, they are all fostered in people's homes prior to adoption.

People have said to me 'I could get a kitten from the farmer down the road for free. And yes, they could.

It is as though people that adopt a rescue cat are expected to be 'extra good' to balance the 'extra bad' owners that went before. I guess if you work for a cat shelter you'd see some horrible things that would damage your trust in the general public.

Like I said above, though, I do understand why checks are needed. But that isn't undermined by setting up a slightly more punter-friendly shop front in pets at home.

(FWIW, we once bought a goldfish from Pets and Home. I think they did a fine job in starting us off as sensible pet owners. They insisted that we bought the owners books and the tank first, and then went home for a week to let it acclimatise, before they'd sell us a £4 fish. The kids took on board the pet care message, and also had fun buying tank toys and getting ready for the new arrival. Responsible without being dour.

I think the 'on the doorstep' aspect of pets at home is as likely to encourage people to take their time waiting for the right cat to come up and to pop back for advice and extra kit - as it is to encourage impulse acquisitions.)

Oh we had a fish from Pets at Home. I had to sign a form to say I would look after it correctly. We bought Spongebob ornaments for the tank.

The cat rescues have a massive responsibility to rehome the cats to decent, loving homes. If the wrong choice is made the cat can end up coming back which is not good at all, or worse still passed from home to home.

But I can see how having them at PAH could work.

I think any initiative that gets more people getting rescue animals rather than buying from breeders is a good thing . Battersea have been doing this for a little while now and apparently it's been very successful. FWIW when we got our puppy from Battersea we got him on the day we visited and didn't have a home check ,just an interview at the centre . We don't live in London ,we obviously answered all the questions to the re homers satisfaction and it was a much easier than trying to get a rabbit from the RSPCA ,which TBH took weeks ( would have been way easier to just buy one )

Last cat we rescued from CP didn't need a home heck, I asked if that was because we were known to them from getting another the year before and they said no, they just couldn't afford to do them anymore.

I imagine it is the travel costs as I'm in a very rural county.

They google addresses for road proximity etc.

When we got a cat - albeit briefly due to unknown allergies - we got ours from the Cats Shelter locally. There was no home visit at all, never even mentioned. I assume not all cat rehoming places do them?

It's just having the cats in a retail environment that sits ill with me on many levels. Also issues of stress from living in a strip lit warehouse!

It's how its done here (canada) - we got both our cats from the 'pet store' who adopt out for a charity

(they don't live in the shop - usually they are fostered and just come in to be viewed).

no home visits, just eleventy million questions. But most cats here are indoor cats anyway.

I turned up at Newcastle Cat and Dog shelter 15 years ago and adopted

this cat after just filling in a form and giving a donation.

As you can see, she's not happy and would much rather be living somewhere else in spite of me trying to take good care of her.

I think it's very sad that cats will be going to PAH God knows who'll end up taking them. I don't even think hamsters and rabbits should be sold in these places.