Best Friends Sanctuary - Stray/Rescue Coventry

14/04/2025

£342 for a drop trap :'(

14/04/2025

cat SAFE flowers..

DID YOU KNOW?

14/04/2025

if you are near Ryton On Dunsmore, please keep an eye out for this chipped and neutered cat with a responsible human ("owner")

❗️ MISSING CAT ❗️
📍 Location - Ryton-on-Dunsmore, Warwickshire, CV8 3J, England
🗣 Name - Ned
🖲 Chipped
✂ Neutered
❌ Was not wearing a collar
for more information about Ned and to contact their owner directly please visit our website https://www.animalsearchuk.co.uk and search their unique reference number- ALP332086.

🚨 PLEASE DON'T REPORT SIGHTINGS ON THIS FACEBOOK PAGE AS THEY MIGHT NOT BE SEEN IMMEDIATELY!

13/04/2025

the gofundme is still active if anyone wants to donate in a verified, secure way.

everyone here from the colony has been vaccinated, neutered, flea treated, wormed etc. (except william who is still poorly on and off despite antibiotics)

sadly most of the rest of the money has been spent on food and litter and fuel...in the absence of anyone with huge supplies of free cat food offering to help free up money for vets!

William needs the vet again.

please help if you can, please share whether you can or can't donate.

Hello, Best Friends Sanctuary Stray/Rescue Coventry here. https://www.facebook.com/bestfriend… Leanne Cordner needs your support for CATS NEED URGENT HELP

13/04/2025

some good advice regarding kittens found outside.

there's a woman in Coventry, who steals healthy 4 week old kittens from mums in her garden, feeds them carnation milk, nearly kills them, does not take them to a vet, then her and her sister sell them to friends!
please do not do this.

these sort of people will just continue the cycle of greeding.

especially when they are the sort of women who buy 3 week old kittens from pet peddlers on marketplace.

POP QUIZ

What do you do if you find a nest of kittens?

Because kitten season is coming at some point and I get calls about finding kittens in a bush, barn, garage, porch, boat, the list is endless.

Well you leave the nest alone. Period.

The only time you touch a nest is when the babies are cold, dirty and maybe one is dead. Move them to a heat source, contact a rescue. Know your rescues who in the area does neonates? Asking a dog rescue is a waste of time, time these babies need. DO NOT FEED THE KITTENS. Feeding cold kittens will kill them. Feeding kittens anything other than formula will kill them..you can use goats milk if needed. But NO cows milk, it will kill them. These babies need to be the perfect temp before you feed.

A good neonate rescue is ready for babies at any time. They have the incubators, formula, everything ready. They know they have to wait 2-3 or four hours to warm up a kitten. They know how to handle kittens in distress.

What a neonate rescue doesn't want, is well cared for, fat, clean kittens. You just kitten napped a moms kittens.

If kittens in a nest are fat, warm, healthy looking. Please leave them alone. We understand you haven't seen mom, but mom is there. It would be super helpful if you supplied a box or a cover of some sort. Food and water for mom. Then contracted a rescue.

A rescue will do a number of things. Leave mom and babies until babies are 5-6 weeks. Put babies in foster care and trap and fix and return mom. If mom can be handled and if a rescue has room they may come and pick up mom and babies. Put them in foster care.

Another option is something we do a lot of. Foster in place. You take in mom and kittens, like into a bathroom, or spare room. We come out and start vaccines on mom. Babies if they are old enough. Make a game plan for when mom will be fixed and when the kittens maybe fixed. We talk about dewormer and if they need flea control. We came back and vaccinate babies when old enough.

Once they are fixed and isolation is done you would have already talked to the coordinator about their adoption plan. And just like that 4 weeks of your time is done and you have helped a mom and babies without using one of my fosters.

It's always great to have the skills in your back pocket. Let's say a family member in another state comes up on the same thing. This is what I did. Contact your rescues and see what they do.

We love this because mom and all babies get fixed. Which ends their cycle. Of course if Dad is around or uncle or aunt let's fix them also. Often times you are not fixing just mom, but the two or three strays hanging around.

So before you kitten nap please look at the situation. Are they gross and dirty and maybe one dead. Pull and put on a heat source and DO NOT FEED. Or are they fat and healthy and mom is just out looking for food.

Know your neonate rescues in the area. If you don't and do a post on FB. You are looking for a neonate rescue. Not some random person who might be able to find her bottle. Not the first person who screams ME!

This guy came to me on loan. He was found in the middle of the street. Nothing made sense. The lady that found him left him in a box on her porch. The neighbor fosters for me, but was out of town so I got to house him until they got back. He is in-between a bottle and eating on his own. So he doesn't need me and when the foster came back to town I handed him back.

We are always looking for fosters. If you live in Lewis or Thurston county and want to foster we are always looking. A coordinator will reach out and chat with you and go from there. Redroseanimalrescue.org foster app

13/04/2025

If anyone has a drop trap i can borrow for some really really annoying cats :P that won't be fooled by a standard trap, please let me know.
I have 2 boys evading capture because they KNOW their feeder will just feed them later, I also have a few females that are ALL going to be pregnant/heavily pregnant by the time they are desperate enough to go in :'(
(all these cats have seen other cats get trapped, so aren't as willing to comply!)

13/04/2025

absolute corkers!
watch and laugh!

https://www.facebook.com/share/r/16paFviJGe/

13/04/2025

When people are kind enough to SHARE my posts, PLEASE consider making your share PUBLIC..
I understand some people may not want to for valid reasons, no doubt i have some people following my posts who wouldn't want me to see their share....i also understand exactly why.

But with shares private to your own profiles, no one really is seeing them.
You may not have many animal lovers on your friends list.
This may also mean the algorhythms decide my posts aren't worth being seen.

I have found many interesting posts thanks to complete strangers posting things with a key word...

Out of 5-10 shares, maybe 2-3 are public.
I realise if they are posted in private groups, i won't be able to see the share..

But PLEASE, try to help me find people with disposable incomes to HELP these cats....

13/04/2025

I often wonder how i manage to take 7 hours to "pop" to a colony!

Everyone knows the sacrifices that animal rescuers make to save not only the cats and dogs in desperate need, but also our local wildlife struggling for help.

Those sacrifices are often the personal time invested, but also the strong emotional impact of seeing the suffering of animals day in and day out, the joys of saving a life that would have perished without intervention, but also the constant stream of dealing with the loss of the ones you can’t save.

But there is a secondary impact that isn’t often discussed. The financial impact of rescuer efforts. On this note, I’m going to focus on the missions throughout the country that focus on TNR (Trap, Neuter, Return of community cats). The vast majority of people who take on the TNR mission utilize their own resources to accomplish this mission. Even if they are part of an organization that receives donations to spay and neuter community cats, there are a lot of secondary expenses that fall on the trappers to secure the cats, get them to clinic, and return them to their colony location.

Most TNR organizations like ours are small. We are just getting by to pay for the spay/neuter surgeries. So I wanted to track what it takes to make that happen. The burden of TNR that falls on the trappers themselves. The vast majority of trapper/transporters utilize their own vehicles and pay for their own gas.

So, my last TNR site was 13 miles away from my home base, but home base is not where we hold the cats before and after surgery. So, how did a TNR project, just 13 miles away, end up as a 229 mile mission?

Well, the TNR site was 13 miles in one direction from home base, but our holding area is 17 miles away in the opposite direction from home base. So, this is how TNR goes.

Head to the site to trap the kitties.

After securing the kitties, bring them to the holding area.

Return to home base.

The next day, return to the holding site to pick them up to drive them to clinic.

Return to home base.

Return to the clinic to pick up the cats from clinic and return them to holding center to recover from surgery.

Return to home base.

Come back to the holding center to load up the cats to bring them back home.

Return to the holding center to unload and clean traps.

Return to home base to complete mission.

The miles accrued from a simple local mission becomes a major travel endeavor, all on the back of the trapper.

One step I didn’t include is the site assessment. This is visiting the site to determine the resources needed to secure the community cats to get them all fixed and vaccinated. That would have been another 26 mile round trip on the volunteer’s dime.

So when you get mad that an organization isn’t doing enough. When you get mad that an organization isn’t “doing their job”, understand that the majority of the people who are doing the ground work are doing it out of their own pockets.

The gas money, the wear and tear of their vehicles, having to replace tires before they would normally be replaced, running their engines, transmissions, their break pads to the ground, oil changes, etc, are all on the volunteer’s dime outside of the money raised to accomplish that one simple task to just spay and neutering some cats.

We are fortunate that we have a low cost spay and neuter clinic in our town. Some organizations drive hours just to have a clinic to fix their secured kitties. I can name Willow Springs Friends of Ferals and City of Mountain Grove, MO Animal Control as examples in our region.

My overall message is to give organizations that take care of community cats a break. We struggle to find the resources to fix these kitties, and the most dedicated volunteers spend thousands of dollars in gas and the breakdown of their personal vehicles to help you.

Have patience with them. We are all out their doing our best. Most people think their situation is more important than everyone else’s. Sometimes they are right, but most times they don’t understand the list we are dealing with, and their is a lack of appreciation of what every volunteer is sacrificing to help you with your current situation.

I would just like everyone to understand that we rescuers are sacrificing everything we can to help you. The money invested by volunteers is often greater than the money raised to help you. If it doesn’t feel like an organization is doing enough for you, just know we are doing everything in our power to help, even if it doesn’t seem like it. The people working the streets often don’t see a dime for their efforts. We are out there, not only for the love of the animals that we save, but to serve the community members impacted by these poor souls within our communities.

So a 13 mile away TNR mission turned into 229 miles. We were fortunate enough to recieve a new vehicle for these missions, but when you see all the previous missions that TNR Patrol accomolished, they were all done with private vehicles, on the volunteers dime. If you following most any other TNR organization, know that it is mostly the same. Volunteers investing thousands of dollars in gas and the breakdown of their personal vehicles to help you. Please be thankful for their efforts even if they can’t be there when you want them to.

13/04/2025

The final baby, "no 4" died early this morning :'(

RIP all 4 baby cats.

Maybe people and charities will really start NAGGING or educating EVERYONE about neutering now.

Obviously, we don't need a hand rear now.
Thanks to everyone who shared or tried to help.

12/04/2025

absolutely wow!

12/04/2025

This beautiful old man, was trapped at a colony this week.
I noticed his tongue was hanging out a little bit.
He has been neutered and ear tipped, but he's clearly abandoned, not feral.
The vets checked his mouth for me and he has mid region dental health needs, but there's no funds for a £600+ dental!

However, he HAS apparently got an ulcer on his tongue.
The vets thinks he's probably FIV+ or FELV.
He's thrown up roundworm this morning after starting panacur!
He's on pain relief to help with the ulcer, but i don't expect it to cure it.

Luckily he will get at least one follow up check post op..
So will see what the vet says, BUT if he needs antibiotics, we will be in trouble.

PLEASE consider helping!

This little man is frail, boney, although he is 3.3kg, he seems underweight.
It would be lovely if people can donate LOTS of food, but I'll settle for a bit, so this lovely fella gets some lovely well deserved dinners.

He was spotted at the colony a few months ago when i was there.
He hadn't been seen before.
So this is why i think he's been dumped.

He will NOT be getting dumped back there.
However, i am not in the luxury position of having lots of active supporters who will find someone to take him in to live out his days in the luxury HE DESERVES!

So what am i to do?

The gofundme for the colony is almost at a standstill.
There's a trickle of £4-20 per month some/most months.

Someone from a company at the colony offered to put £300 down at a vets for me to get William or someone a swab test for whatever he/they are suffering from.
This has not been done sadly.

This little man will get what he needs, but not magically instantly unfortunately.
He will be fed, warm and cared for...
The basics.

If anyone wants to criticise that, then I'm pretty sure it will be someone who is doing NOTHING to help any of these cats.
So i won't be taking that criticism on board or giving it any validity!

The alternative is dump him back at the colony, to get thinner and thinner, and eventually drop dead.

If I'm a bad person for not dumping him back, then hey ho. :D

Please see the PINNED POST at the top of this page for details of how to help.
you can send food, order food and drop off, donate direct to vets (in some cases) or donate to bank or gofundme.

PLENTY of ways to suit you to help the CAT/s, not me.

Thanks for reading

12/04/2025

Handsome big boy Simba , NEEDS a home!

12/04/2025

IF ONLY

Last week i trapped this girl at one of my colonies.
I tried repeatedly not to..
She would not stay away from the trap.

I had seen her looking a bit plump weeks before,
They have found a feeder there, who said they had also seen her looking larger than usual.
I had no way of knowing if she had been pregnant, had worms, pyometra...or anything.
Then she was hardly seen.

Obviously i assumed she was pregnant.
By this time, the kittens (if she had been pregnant) would have been around 2 weeks old.

Now i'm not ashamed or proud to admit, i had a massive dilemma and didn't know what to do.

All i could do was what i thought was best at the time.
No winning ending either way.

With most people finding kittens only contacting the obvious charities, so someone like me has no contact point, it is impossible to find someone to give you access to locked locations.

Some will. Most are skeptical and assume everyone is a fraud these days.

Even the feeder has never text me to help me plan to catch these cats, so i can't rely on them to inform me if/when the cat showed up with or without kittens, they have, previously contacted a local charity , more than once i believe, as has a local business about these cats, (mainly finding the odd kitten) , but this charity has repeatedly failed to locate any ferals, much less get any neutered.
I have explained exactly where they are, how many, what colours and still they are all there breeding (apart from the several/dozen i have already done over the last few years).
IF ONLY i didn't have to beg others for funds for neutering, 2 or 3 here and there-after having to be subjected to ego rants and accusations that they are "doing me a favour"... I could have got them all done in 2021, instead of the national charity REFUSING to fund it! and leaving them to get on with breeding.

Thanks to my trolls and sad little women in rescue who SHOULD know better and do better, i have very few contacts to instantly have other options.

So without someone on hand i could immediately collect a cat cam from, to track the cat if i let her go from the trap..the only options were 1. release her, hope i can trap her in future, incase she has live babies. or 2. get her spayed the next morning and release her immediately after (not ideal) and hope the babies (if there were any) had been safe enough to live through the night! :O

I didn't like either option.

I called a trusted rescue friend for advice.
They agreed that both options were not good options.
But we seemed to reluctantly agree with a degree of impending horror, that she needed neutering, I might not ever get her again, and most babies in that location are never seen again :'(

So with a REALLY heavy heart, i kept her in the carrier, took her to be spayed, then released her as soon as i got out of the vets, back at the location.

I still feel sick about it.
I just hope if there were babies, they are ok.
In future, i think i will release a suspected mum cat...
There is just no foolproof way of dealing with this.

Some cats i have chosen not to trap previously, have just continued to breed. I did not want that to happen again.

PLEASE , if anyone has useful items like wildlife cameras they don't need, donate them. If more people helped me with cat food (the source of some semi regular food, being removed due to lies spread by RESCUES-you'd be shocked if you knew all of them), then i would have some of MY money left to buy necessary things for these circumstances that many other rescues have LOTS of as standard.

If there was help with vet bills more, or someone willing to try to raise funds/apply for grants etc, then i could use MY money for these items.

I appreciate every bit of help i get, but it's never enough, a 12 pack of cat sachets only feeds the kittens alone ONCE a day.
Not even the ferals that can't be homed, the disabled cats here, the ones awaiting neutering, the emergency mum of the babies needing hand rearing.

IF ONLY i had more help.
I have about a dozen regular/semi regular wonderful helpers/donators, but that's it, out of 1.2K followers.

IF ONLY there were funds for a cat cam, I could have located babies, then trapped mum safely, then got her neutered, instead of this anxiety inducing outing :/

EVERY PENNY donated, EVERY bit of food, etc, goes to these/street cats EVERY time.
I can't stretch my finances anymore.
All i can do is feed cheaper food to make it last longer/feed more cats.

IF ONLY i had 9 messages out of 10 asking about adoption, instead of 9 finding cats/kittens in their gardens or wanting to relinquish their cat/kittens, and only 1 either offering some food or enquiring about adopting, things would be so much easier.

PLEASE ask your friends, family, neighbours to support THESE CATS, NOT me, the CATS!
I see rescues popping up , only set up a few onths ago with 3 THOUSAND followers, when they can't get enough money donated, they pack up!
And there's me, struggling on, begging for help over TEN YEARS later.
I have ALWAYS paid for everything myself until the last couple of years, when it's just costing TOO much money!
Vets, food, litter, EVERYTHING has almost doubled in cost.

I will die before i just quit because i have to spend my own monthly money on other peoples cats!
I turn MOST requests for help away, because there's not enough money to do anything more than i'm doing now.

I REALLY need some help over here..
There are rescues with access to apply for THOUSANDS of pounds in funds/grants MULTIPLE times a year to multiple grant sources, who still ask daily/weekly for donations..

Please stop asking me to help lots of other cats if you haven't even donated £1 ever, much less signed up to donate £1 per month/£12 per YEAR to help me help these cats.

It's just impossible.

The charities all bang on about non charities, but WHY are there so many cats breeding on the streets if they are doing such a good job and one man bands like me are infringing/stealing their "work"?

Multiple charities were called to these cold, starving to death babies this week...not one went and collected them.
Not one has since offered to collect them to get them to an experienced hand rear foster.

A possible option on the table, after i messaged people asking for help, won't take them because they are from a home with ringworm!

And THIS is why people like me TRY to help.
I'm not the big "I am", I'm just one person who feels sorry for cats and kittens LEFT OUTSIDE by other rescues and charities who will NOT take kittens out of a bush, when they KNOW they have cat flu, chlamydia etc.
THEY HAVE THE FUNDS TO DO IT/SORT IT!
Not me!

But i will go bankrupt trying, unlike them, who won't dent their bank accounts trying.

I have taken so many cat flu kittens that charities refused to acknowledge when finders contacted them!

But I have one nut job telling everyone I'm the problem?
And other rescues accusing me of hoarding because it takes me WAY LONGER to get everyone seen/medicated/cured, than these rescues with TONNES of money, who WON'T go and get them!

Surely the cats are better off FED, NOT collapsing and dying in the street (like Williams sister did!) than being in a bush, slowly dehydrating/starving? Even if it does take a while to get them sorted?
Shoot me for being so evil that i live in a house falling to bits, because I spend EVERY available penny of MY money on cats needing help.
When others refuse.....

If anyone would like to send food etc, the links and details are in the pinned post at the top of this page.
We are ALWAYS desperate for WET FOOD.
ALWAYS.

And i don't get a company to donate pallets and pallets of it with a "charity number" then sell it on facebook!!

12/04/2025

12/04/2025

it's not hard to be kind to animals.
seagulls deserve kindness too.
i love how they make even a council estate sound like holiday!