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Cat desexing trial achieves milestone while managing overpopulation and welfare | Weddin Landcare

By Toby Davidson posted 17-10-2022 11:24

  

Weddin Shire Council, in partnership with RSPCA, Weddin Landcare and Lachlan Valley Vets has passed a major milestone in their attempts to address the overpopulation and welfare of cats in their local council area.

On Tuesday, October 11, the 100th local cat had been desexed as part of the RSPCA NSW's Keeping Cats Safe at Home Project - one of seven evidence-based best practice free cat desexing and microchipping programs currently run in the state.

Council Ranger Allison Knowles said the 'Keeping Cats Safe At Home" Project has provided residents from the Weddin Shire the opportunity to have their cats microchipped and desexed for free.

Lachlan Valley Vets' Tess Bailey-King said the up take from the community in getting their cats de-sexed was large.

RSPCA NSW's Dr Gemma Ma said they have seven of these de-sexing projects underway with seven councils across the state, which is funded by a grant from the NSW state government.

Weddin Landcare's Melanie Cooper said they jumped on board to collaborate in this program to help protect and improve local biodiversity.

"Part of that is helping to reduce the predation of some of our [native animals] particularly our small woodlands birds. "Controlling their [cats] numbers is incredibly important. They are an incredibly hard predator to control, so tackling it at the source is really important," Mrs Cooper said.

Weddin Landcare has been working closely with the Council on the program from the beginning and have been helping to promote the program, with the response from the community has been incredible, Mrs Cooper said.

In Weddin they identified that accessibility of desexing was an issue - including getting cats to the vet, affording the de-sexing, catching the cat and transporting it to the vet. Moving forward, they will be running the de-sexing project until the end of 2024, and they will be running information campaigns about getting your cats de-sexed and preventing your cats from roaming!


This is great news for the small native animals out and about! Have you heard of similar trials - this would be a great national program, don't you think?


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