How To Help

So You Want to Help Cats and Kittens…

That's great! Fostering can be an extremely rewarding experience, and you can help us to save lives.

Before You Start

Before you start fostering, make sure that you understand the commitment.

Considerations:

• Is your household appropriate for young kittens?
• Is everyone you live with accepting of foster kittens?
• Does your schedule allow for kitten care?
• Depending on the age and health of the kittens, you may need to be available as often as every 2-3 hours.
• Does your schedule work better for older kittens? Adolescents? Adult cats?
• Do you have resident cats/ dogs/ children and how might they be involved?
• Do you have a space for them that is safe and easy to clean?
• Are you able to separate them from other animals?

If you've answered these questions and feel prepared to take on the responsibility of fostering that’s great!

Once you fill out the FOSTERING APPLICATION a foster coordinator will contact you to set up a Zoom call.

During the Zoom we will ask you to turn the camera around and let us see your space. Please don't clean up! We aren’t interested in your style or housekeeping but looking to help with cat proofing, to ensure the best fit with cats and help to highlight the best areas in the home for the cat, along with potential dangers.

Abbey Cats can't take cats in unless we have somewhere for them to go.

We try to do as much matchmaking in placing cats in your care as we do when adopting them.

On the zoom call we will discuss what types of cats/ kitten situations best suit you (Pregnant cats? Nursing mom and kittens? Weaned kittens? Adolescents? Adult?)

We will also talk about creating a safe space for your fosters.

Preparing for Fostering

There are several supplies you will need when fostering kittens. For a list of essential supplies, see our FOSTERING CHECKLIST.

You'll want to prepare a home base for your cat/ kittens. It's important that this home base be quarantined from other animals, safe and warm.

Your home base should be a small room with a door that closes, so they can be separated from other animals.

Make sure the area is kitten proof -- you'd be amazed what trouble kittens can get into. For instance, you want to make sure there is not a trash can or toilet they can fall into, a curtain they can climb, a toxic plant they can eat, a small space they can hide or get stuck in.

Getting Your Kittens Adopted

When your fosters are ready to be adopted, you will be asked to send in some good photos and a write up that tells a potential adopter about their personalities.

This is submitted via a Google form

Abbey Cats social media volunteers will post the bios.

Once applications come in, our Abbey Cats screeners will contact the potential adopter and ask them more questions. If it seems a good fit, you will be contacted to participate in a three way zoom call (Foster parent, Potential Adopter and Abbey Cats Adoption Facilitator).

Saying Goodbye

If everyone agrees that it is a good fit, the adoption will be finalized, paperwork submitted, and the adopter will make arrangements to pickup their new family member

Saying goodbye might be hard, but it is truly the best part of fostering, because it means you've opened your heart and your home and truly saved a life🐾💗

Adopters often keep in touch and update us as their cats/ kitten's adjust to their new lives. Receiving updates are wonderful because you can see the happy ever afters!

Second only to finding a permanent home for each and every cat in the program, fostering is one of the most important aspects of Abbey Cat Adoptions. We do not have a shelter and rely exclusively on volunteer foster homes to care for our cats while they await placement in permanent homes. Every time a new foster place is created through adoption or the recruitment of a new volunteer foster parent, a cat or kitten can be rescued from being euthanized or dying of exposure.

From special needs cats who need to spend a few months with experienced cat owners to healthy well socialized cats who just need an emergency stopover while their adoption is being arranged, ACA needs foster homes for every imaginable situation.

We try to place cats in foster homes most appropriate for their age, temperament and circumstances so we ask that all potential foster parents fill out a questionnaire.