By Austin Mirmina.
Sue Kautz thought Rooney, an eight-week-old orange tabby cat, was going to be a lifer.
After trapping and rescuing Rooney four years ago, Kautz, 67, who runs a private charity called “Haddam Animal Rescue,” considered putting the kitten in a barn to provide pest control, eventually deciding against it.
“This guy’s got potential,” Kautz remembered thinking. “I’d hate to put him in a barn when he could be a loving house cat.”
Rooney, though, had a feral streak; he lacked the tenderness shown by ordinary house cats and wanted nothing to do with his potential adopters.
“He always did have that edge,” Kautz said. “Anybody that would ever come look at him … he would just run and hide. He didn’t present well.”
Kautz saw the kitty tealeaves, saying she was doubtful that Rooney would ever be adopted. But then the unthinkable happened – a nationwide pandemic struck, closing animal shelters and flooding Kautz with calls from people trying to adopt. Rooney finally found a home.
Rooney is one of Kautz’s more memorable moments in a hobby that rewards very little. She’s single-handedly run her private charity for 18 years; most of her work involves trapping feral cats and paying out of pocket to get them neutered. It was a hobby born out of love for animals. But the financial strain coupled with dwindling energy has left her feeling unsure of how much longer she can continue.
Kautz has filled a void in the community since her retirement as a hospice home care nurse in 2011: Haddam Animal Control doesn’t deal with feral cats, and only Killingworth resident Francine Pelegano, who also runs a private charity called “Almost Home for Cats,” does similar work.
In addition to fielding more adoption calls because of Covid-19, Kautz has been working hard this summer to trap and neuter feral cats during “mating season,” a time when feral cat reproduction is at its peak. After identifying the location of a colony of stray cats, Kautz said she lays a trap using different sized cages loaded with cat food as bait.
Occasionally Kautz captures friendly cats and lists them on pet finder websites to be adopted. But most of the time her traps are filled with frantic feral cats that are brought to the veterinarian to be neutered, a process that aims to break the mating cycle and stabilize feral cat populations.
Daun Kowalski, who is Haddam’s animal control officer, called Kautz an “invaluable resource” for Haddam because, without her effort, the feral cat situation could escalate into a public health issue.
Kautz said a main source of the problem is irresponsible owners who abandon their cats once they no longer want to take care of them, something she’s noticed people doing near exit 8 off Route 9.
Janice Cavanaugh, 63, is a volunteer worker for Cat Tales, a non-profit organization that rescues stray and feral cats in Middletown and Portland. Cavanaugh also pointed to the negligence of owners as a big reason for the feral cat problem, saying people frequently dump their animals at feeding stations maintained by Cat Tales.
“I have come in to find on top of our feeding station an animal – a cat in a carrier that someone has left there,” Cavanaugh said. “Most of the time [owners] are desperate.”
That desperation from owners might be the result of increasing veterinarian costs, Kautz said. The average cost of a neutering surgery in Middlesex County ranges from $175 to $695 for a male cat, and from $285 to $800 for a female cat, according to Cavanaugh.
“[People] take a free kitten with the best intention,” Cavanaugh said, stressing that owners need to take more responsibility for getting their cats neutered to help break the cycle of feral cat reproduction.
Some low-cost neutering services are available; one mobile clinic, called TEAM, charges $135 for a neuter surgery, including certain vaccinations like rabies. Kautz said she takes her cats to the Chester Veterinary Clinic, which offers her a discounted rate for its neutering service.
But because feral cats are returned back to their colonies after getting neutered, Kautz said she doesn’t recoup any of the money she spends getting them fixed. And her private charity doesn’t receive government funding, like other non-profits such as Cat Tales, so she relies heavily on donations and adoption fees from non-feral cats to stay afloat.
Her expenses accumulate quickly; between the cost of heat and air conditioning for her cat storage outbuilding, litter, food, and medication, Kautz usually pays out-of-pocket to keep things going. She called it “a labor of love.”
Kautz said she wants to move on from rescuing cats within the next couple of years. She said she’s tired of caring after so many cats; right now she can’t leave her house or go on vacation without hiring someone to look after them. And she’d like to spend more time doing activities she enjoys, like gardening and yoga.
“It feels like I’m never done – there’s always more I could be doing,” Kautz said.
Although Kautz is rarely satisfied with her work, one could hear the joy and delight in her voice while discussing Rooney, the orange tabby cat, who serves as an example of her legacy.
More information can be found on Haddam Animal Rescue Facebook page.
