The first rule of holes

This is a post in which I go all ranty-pantie about something that's bugging me. You've been warned!

I've been fostering a couple of kittens in my spare room, to give the FC (foster coordinator) a break while she prepared for and recovered from surgery. Some of the other volunteers have taken on extra fosters, too, to help out.

Last Wednesday was surgery day, so I checked facebook last Thursday morning to see how the FC made out, only to find an entry about three more kittens she had taken in that day.

And I really, really wanted to comment, "You're going the wrong way! You're supposed to adopt them OUT, not keep taking them IN!"

I then checked the website. The rescue group currently has seventeen kittens and nine adult cats we are trying to find homes for. Some of the kittens are starting to age out, meaning they are looking less like kittens and more like adult cats, and are thus much less likely to be adopted. Adoptions have been slow this summer, the group has taken in more cats than it can find homes for, and all of the shelters and rescues in the area are full.

And the FC just had surgery.

And she just took in three more kittens.

THIS is what makes me crazy about cat people. THIS is why rescues get overwhelmed and shut down operations, forcing other local groups to take on a sudden influx of cats when they are already full. THIS is what is wrong with rescue people: They don't know how to say no.

Look, I get it. What the hell are you SUPPOSED to do when somebody calls up and tells you they just found a box of two-week-old kittens by the side of the road? When you know that all of the other shelters and rescues are full? When you know that the kittens will probably be abandoned if you don't take them in? I get it. I do.

But I also know that a lot of the time when someone calls saying they "found" a litter of kittens, those kittens actually belong to them, because they never bothered to get their female cat spayed, and now they just want to unload the kittens. I know, too, that the FC currently has nine adult cats and several litters of kittens at her house. It's almost impossible to keep sick ones properly quarantined in that kind of situation, and when cats are overcrowded, Mother Nature has a way of taking care of that by sending down a nasty virus that kills off most of them.

That's horrifying, I know. I don't like to think about it, and I certainly don't wish it on anyone. But that's what happens when rescue situations get out of control. You don't hear about it, because it certainly isn't publicized, but it happens all the time, everywhere. Either disease sweeps through an overcrowded rescue, or the rescue head gets overwhelmed and closes up shop.

And it could happen here. Because the head of the rescue group doesn't know how to say no. And that makes me sad.