Officials Brace for Hundreds of Unwanted Cats

A handful of dogs in Ventura County have contracted valley fever over the past few months, but animal experts warn that a more widespread ailment has stricken the county’s cat population--spring fever.

Officials with the Humane Society and county Animal Regulation say the cry of feral felines in heat this season is a harbinger of the hundreds of kittens that will be born in the spring. Most of them will have to be destroyed.

“They’re all in heat right now,” said Jolene Hoffman, director of the Humane Society shelter in Ojai. “It’s a horrible time of year. Every cat that has been coming in has been in heat or pregnant.”

In late February and March, female cats enter the first of two annual reproductive cycles triggered by a change in the seasons. The cycles last for weeks.

“If they are out and they’re not spayed, you just assume they’re pregnant,” said Dr. Sean McCormack, a veterinarian at the Conejo Valley Veterinary Clinic in Thousand Oaks.

The result of this spring fever is kittens, which are often dumped at animal shelters, Hoffman said.

Three years ago, the Ojai shelter was receiving up to 60 kittens a day, she said. Last year, the numbers varied from one to 20 a day.

“It’s just like having an assembly line all day long,” Hoffman said.

Animal Regulation now has 40 cats at its Camarillo shelter, but that number will swell to nearly 1,000 in coming months, Director Kathy Jenks said.

“We are now getting litters born and this will go on through October,” Jenks said. “The problem is the number of kittens we have to kill.”

Hoffman agreed.

“Right now you can’t find any kittens (but) look in the papers in May, end of April, people can’t get rid of them,” Hoffman said. “Spay and neuter--that is the only answer. (People) have got to become responsible pet owners.”