Rescue centre adoption too difficult?

[vinegarqueen]

Ok I'll accept a little grilling here. Just been through the bruising experience of trying to find a rescue centre to adopt a cat from. I have found one now, but it's taken ages. I live abroad and one of them wanted us to put wire caging or plexiglass over every single window or glassed door in case cat got out. One said we had to have an indoor cat (fine) and then said they wouldn't let us adopt one because our particular island has too many snakes outside. One volunteer said we were just more of a dog family and wouldn't we like to see the puppies (DH doesn't like dogs). One said no children. Arg.


Throughout this I have had a little voice -my sister- saying ”you could just BUY one”. I just wonder how many otherwise good potential owners just end up getting frustrated and forking out for a purebreed, or worse, going on gumtree, because rescue centres are overly picky? I understand if you have an issue like allergies or another pet that is incompatible or whatever. But, ”more of a dog family”?? Really??

[Jellylegss]

Personally I always try to find smaller rescues or recommend asking in at your local vet (ours lets clients rehome on their notice board)

Years ago I went to a big rescue and had the following issues.
1- I was young for the experience I had.. yep I grew up in a rural area with farms in the family so I’d indefinitely helped with more than 1 cat and had lived with 2 I could remember.
2- I lived in a flat, I wanted an indoor cat.. I was also not allowed to let the cat out..
3-I lived near a school so those pesky kids 5 floors down outside where the cat wasn’t allowed would obviously jump up like ninjas to harass the cat.
4- I didn’t know what gender or coat type i wanted.. really I didn’t care if it had long hair or no hair, balls or not. It was a cat for company it could’ve looked however it pleased.
5- I didn’t have an account with the vet.. well I didn’t have a pet, I hardly thought about taking myself in for some flea treatment being a human after all

I walked into my vet spoke to a receptionist who told me to speak to a small rescue in particular, I asked for the oldest/longest serving resident as all I wanted was a cat who needed a home, I left 20 minutes later with an elderly extremely over weight chap (still feline ) he only lived another year.. he was almost 16 when I took him on though so I knew he wouldn’t be around forever but he obviously had a much better year than in a shelter.

[AwkwardSquad]

Blimey. So many hoops! Our first two cats were via private rehoming from a friend who’d taken in a pregnant stray, and our current cat came via the RSPCA. They were perfectly reasonable with us (even though we most definitely did NOT live in a mansion with unlimited outdoor space and no roads...) and the process was straightforward. Sounds like that’s rare.

[CatchingBabies]

I was turned down for a rescue cat as my dog isn’t vaccinated. The fact the we nearly lost him a pup due to a severe reaction to his vaccinations and that the vet advised we don’t give him annnual boosters wasn’t a good enough reason apparently. The cats are vaccinated but that didn’t matter. We wonder why we have so many cats sitting in rescue!