Animal Outreach of Shelby County

09/05/2026

WHY WON’T WE COME TRAP FOR YOU?
OR JUST TAKE THOSE CUTE LITTLE KITTENS YOU FOUND?

It’s kitten season, which means we’re getting tagged in lots of posts about moms and kittens under decks, in sheds, behind businesses, and around neighborhoods. ❤️🐈

So why doesn’t Animal Outreach just come trap them and take the kittens?

Because we aren’t a shelter, and we generally don’t intake kittens from the public. We’re a community cat/TNR organization, and our goal isn’t simply to make this litter disappear. Our goal is to stop the NEXT litter, too.

Those cute kittens are only part of the problem. Mom needs spayed. Dad needs neutered. And there are often other unfixed cats nearby that nobody has noticed yet.

If we take four kittens but leave the adults reproducing, we haven’t really solved anything. We’ve just made room for the next four kittens.

And this is where you become a really important part of the solution.

Animal Outreach was built around a “teach a woman to fish” philosophy. Rather than having a small handful of volunteers personally trap every cat in Shelby County, we teach YOU how to trap. We loan the traps and equipment, connect you with resources, walk you through the process, and help you make a plan to get the cats fixed.

Think about the math:

One home with a mom and four kittens? Doable.

Four homes calling the same week? Now that’s 16 kittens needing food, litter, vaccines, deworming, flea treatment, spay/neuter, socialization and homes — PLUS four moms, the dads, and any other unfixed cats in those colonies.

Then next week, the phone rings again.

That model burns rescue volunteers out incredibly quickly, and ultimately helps fewer cats.

Community TNR works differently.

You know where the cats eat. You know when they show up. You know which cats belong to the colony. We bring the knowledge, equipment, resources and support. Together, we get the baby-making machines fixed — not just the babies they produced.

And sometimes our volunteers can pitch in with trapping or other pieces of the project. But our model isn’t “call us and we’ll come take your cat problem away.”

It’s “We’ll help you solve it.” ❤️

That’s how four volunteers can help dozens of people help hundreds of cats — and how a community actually gets ahead of kitten season instead of drowning in litter after litter.

If you have community cats or a mom and kittens who need help, start here: shelbycats.com/tnrworks and complete the form at the bottom of the page. We’ll help you figure out the next step.

Request Help Trap, Neuter, Return (TNR) Program Animal Outreach of Shelby County helps caretakers of community, unowned, or feral cats with a Trap, Neuter, Return (TNR) Program. We focus on humanely reducing the number of community cats living on our streets. Last fall, we started hosting a large vo...

08/22/2026

YOU DID IT!! THANK YOU!!!!!

we're only $19 away now! Let's do this!

Support your favorite rescue — boxes and toys ship directly to the cats who need them most.

08/22/2026

🚨 **WE ONLY NEED $69!** 🚨

That’s it. **$69 more and an ENTIRE CASE of Hide & Scratch boxes will be headed to our cats!** 📦🐈

Can you throw **$5 or $10** at the thermometer and help us get there?

👉 **DONATE HERE:** https://www.giveacatabox.com/graysons-brave-boxes

Here’s how it works: Our friends at **Grayson’s Brave Boxes** are raising money to send Hide & Scratch boxes to cat rescues. Every time the thermometer reaches **$150**, a full case ships directly to the featured rescue.

**And right now, that rescue is US!** 😻

📦 Why are we so excited about cardboard boxes?

Because, well… **cats.** 😂

But these are especially cool cardboard boxes. Hide & Scratch boxes give our cats a place to **hide, scratch, play, nap, decompress, and feel safe.** They’re wonderful enrichment for kittens in foster care and cats waiting for their new homes.

And we are **SO. CLOSE.**

🐾 14 people × $5 = DONE.
🐾 7 people × $10 = DONE.
🐾 1 person with $69 and a deep commitment to cats having excellent cardboard boxes = **VERY DONE.** 😂

Every dollar counts toward that $150 goal.

**Who wants to help us knock out this last $69 and get a case headed our way?!** 🙋‍♀️📦🐈

👉 https://www.giveacatabox.com/graysons-brave-boxes

And if you can’t donate, **share this post!** Maybe one of your friends is the aforementioned person with a deep commitment to excellent cardboard boxes. 😹❤️

Support your favorite rescue — boxes and toys ship directly to the cats who need them most.

08/22/2026

🐾🐱 National Take Your Cat to the Vet Day 🐱🐾

A simple wellness visit can make a big difference in a cat’s life. Routine exams help identify health issues early and ensure cats receive the care they need to thrive.

If cost is a concern, check with local shelters, rescues, and community organizations about low-cost veterinary resources in your area.

Healthy cats make happy homes! ❤️🐾

08/08/2026

🐱❤️ Happy National Cat Day! ❤️🐱

Today we celebrate the cats who fill our homes with love, laughter, purrs, and just a little bit of mischief.

Whether they’re curled up in our laps, knocking things off shelves, or demanding treats at 3 a.m., our feline friends make life brighter every day.

Share a photo of your favorite kitty in the comments and tell us what makes them special! 🐾

08/07/2026

🐱 We don't want to rescue the same colony one litter at a time.

Here's a situation that comes up at our organization all the time:

Someone finds a litter of kittens outside and asks us to take them.

Of course we want to help the kittens.

But one of the first questions we're going to ask is:

Where did the kittens come from — and what's the plan for Mom?

Because taking the kittens and leaving an intact mother cat behind isn't solving the problem.

It's just taking this season's kittens.

This is something called an upstream approach to rescue.

Picture kittens floating down a river.

Downstream, we're frantically pulling kittens out of the water. We put them into foster homes. We feed them. Deworm them. Vaccinate them. Treat their eye infections and diarrhea. Get them spayed and neutered. Take pictures. Write adoption bios. Process applications. Find adopters.

And then someone yells:

"Here come more kittens!"

So we pull those out, too.

And more come.

And more.

At some point, somebody needs to walk upstream and figure out why kittens keep ending up in the river.

For community cats, we already know why.

There are intact cats reproducing.

If we remove a litter of kittens but nobody gets Mom spayed, she can have another litter.

And if there are other intact females in the colony, they'll have kittens, too.

Meanwhile, every litter we take into rescue requires a tremendous amount of resources.

A foster home — one of our most precious and limited resources.

Food.

Litter.

Vaccines.

Dewormers.

Flea treatment.

Medical care.

Spay/neuter surgery.

Microchips.

Staff and volunteer time.

Adoption space.

And money.

Using all of those resources to remove kittens from an unmanaged colony while leaving the kitten-producing factory running is not a sustainable model of rescue.

Yep. We said kitten-producing factory. 😹

Because that's essentially what we've left behind.

This doesn't mean we don't rescue kittens from community cat colonies.

We absolutely do.

But whenever possible, kitten rescue needs to be connected to a plan for the colony they came from.

Take the kittens.

Socialize them.

Get them healthy.

Find them wonderful homes.

AND FIX MOM.

And Dad.

And Grandma.

And Aunt Susan.

And that giant tomcat who mysteriously appears at 2 a.m. but somehow seems to be related to every kitten in the neighborhood.

😂

That's how we actually change things.

And here's another important piece of this:

Someone connected to that colony has to participate.

You don't necessarily need to know how to trap cats. You don't need to own traps. You don't need to know everything about TNR.

Those are things we can help with.

But we can't sustainably operate a system where someone hands the kittens to rescue and walks away while the adult cats continue reproducing.

Someone has to feed consistently.

Someone has to figure out how many cats are there.

Someone has to help us identify Mom.

Someone has to learn the trapping process or work with a trapper.

Someone has to help get those cats to spay/neuter appointments.

Because rescue isn't just removing the cute, adoptable part of the problem.

That's downstream rescue.

We want to go upstream.

We want those kittens to be the last litter born in that colony.

Think about the difference.

If we take four kittens into foster care and leave Mom intact, we've saved four kittens.

That's wonderful.

But we haven't reduced the number of kittens who will need us next year.

If we take those same four kittens and spay Mom and the other reproducing cats in that colony, we've done something much bigger.

We've helped today's kittens.

And we've prevented tomorrow's.

That matters enormously for a small rescue with limited foster homes, limited volunteers and limited dollars.

Every foster home we have needs to do as much lifesaving work as possible.

Every donated dollar needs to stretch as far as possible.

And every time we have the opportunity to stop the cycle instead of simply responding to the next emergency, we need to take it.

So when someone contacts us about outdoor kittens and we start asking questions about Mom, Dad, the other cats, feeding, trapping and TNR, we're not trying to make it harder to get help.

We're trying to make sure we're actually solving the problem.

Because our goal isn't to become incredibly efficient at pulling kittens out of the river.

Our goal is to have fewer kittens in the river in the first place.

Rescue the kittens.

Fix the colony.

Stop the cycle.

That's upstream rescue. ❤️🐱

08/04/2026

📣 Mark your calendars! our Animal Outreach e-newsletter arrives this Thursday!

Inside, you’ll meet Willie, a community cat whose recent emergency reminded us just how important a safety net can be. His story is one of hope, compassion, and the incredible impact of a caring community.

Be sure to check your inbox Thursday for the full story and more Animal Outreach updates! 🐾💙

If you haven’t signed up yet, do it now! @ Shelbycats.com

08/02/2026

Back-to-school is almost here… the kids are counting down to seeing their friends again, and my cat is counting down to finally having the house and the couch back all to themselves. 🐱📚😂

07/30/2026

She’d be perfect for anyone living in a nice, quiet apartment!