By Joette Emerton | Individual Giving Manager
Dear Friend,
A single unspayed cat can lead to 370,000 kittens in just seven years. But we stopped that number in its tracks — sterilising 101 cats in Parkwood and Ottery in just one high impact day of action.
The SPCA’s We Step In outreach campaign targets areas hardest hit by pet overpopulation, and this latest effort is part of a broader, urgent push to tackle the problem head-on. South Africa is in the grip of a pet overpopulation crisis. Shelters are full. Homes are few. Animals are breeding faster than they can be rescued — and it’s preventable.
Timed ahead of South Africa’s peak kitten season (September to February), the mass sterilisation drive aimed to curb the seasonal influx of unwanted litters we generally experience from October every year. Several cats were already on heat when they were admitted for surgery.
Cats can reproduce up to three times a year, with litters ranging from two to nine kittens. The impact of even a handful of unsterilised animals compounds quickly — especially in under-resourced communities where access to veterinary care is a challenge.
“When one pet becomes ten, many families simply can’t cope,” Abraham explains. “They’re forced to surrender or abandon animals they can no longer feed. This is how the cycle of suffering begins. We can’t rescue or adopt our way out of this crisis, sterilisation is the only real solution.”
Community participation was key to the campaign’s success. Cat owners were encouraged to sign up via a digital link circulated on the Parkwood Community Upliftment WhatsApp group, allowing the SPCA team to plan and prepare ahead of time.
Making sure we had enough cat carriers was a challenge but the SPCA team got creative — building custom cat carriers from milk crates, fitted with secure wooden lids. It was a low-cost, high-impact solution that enabled safe, efficient transport of cats to and from their homes and safe holding at our field hospital.
We didn’t stop at sterilisation, because animal welfare is never about a single procedure — it’s about the whole animal, and the people who care for them. That’s why every one of the 101 cats received a full circle of care:
At the SPCA, we don’t only step in when animals are neglected or abused. We step in when they are loved too — because love without means shouldn’t mean losing a pet to a preventable disease.
Please continue to support sterilisation as a frontline defence against pet overpopulation. Our sterilisation outreaches are resource dependent and we can only continue with ongoing support for these initiatives from people like you.
Thank you for your support so far!
Kind regards,
Joette Emerton
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