Town Cats - Volunteers

A Nonprofit, No-Kill Feline Adoption Center/Shelter and Feral Cat Advocacy Organization serving Santa Clara County, California.


P.O. Box 1828 Morgan Hill, CA 95038-1828 Phone: (408) 779-5761 FAX: (408) 779-9319 towncats@garlic.com

		Ode to Maya & Naughty

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URGENT
Town Cats needs your help!!

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The Starfish

A Story that reflects the feelings and motivations of the Town Cats Volunteers.

Read Gramp's Story




Volunteer Help Wanted! Volunteer Cat Care Shelter Technicians needed at the Town Cats No Kill shelter facility in Morgan Hill. Part Time volunteer positions available. We are a free roaming shelter and the cats make a mess and require our care to keep them fed, clean and healthy! The cats' love will be your biggest reward! If you love cats and want to nurture them and take pride in watching the cats flourish under your care, you are the person we need! The work includes cage/litterbox cleaning, feeding, sweeping, mopping, laundry - you set the pace and work with minimal supervision. We need motivated, self starters as you work on your own after training. If interested please send an email to: towncats@garlic.com.

Meet some of the Towncats Volunteers! Reading about the volunteers, their stories, and their positions will give you an idea of what keeps this organization going! (Specific titles/positions are listed further down the page.) April, 2008 volunteer of the month! March, 2008 volunteer of the month! February, 2008 volunteer of the month! January, 2008 volunteers of the month! November, 2007 volunteers of the month! October, 2007 volunteers of the month! August/September, 2007 volunteer of the month! June/July, 2007 volunteers of the month! April/May, 2007 volunteers of the month! March, 2007 volunteer of the month! February, 2007 volunteer of the month! January, 2007 volunteer of the month! December, 2006 volunteer of the month! November, 2006 volunteer of the month! September/October, 2006 volunteer of the month! August, 2006 volunteer of the month! July, 2006 volunteer of the month! June, 2006 volunteer of the month! April, 2006 volunteer of the month! March, 2006 volunteer of the month! February, 2006 volunteer of the month! December, 2005/January 2006 volunteer of the month! November, 2005 volunteer of the month! October, 2005 volunteers of the month! September, 2005 volunteer of the month! August, 2005 volunteer of the month! July, 2005 volunteer of the month! June, 2005 volunteer of the month/memorial May, 2005 volunteer of the month! April, 2005 volunteer of the month! March, 2005 volunteer of the month! February, 2005 volunteer of the month! January, 2005 volunteer of the month! December, 2004 volunteer of the month! October/November, 2004 volunteer of the month! September, 2004 volunteers of the month! July/August, 2004 volunteer of the month! June, 2004 volunteer of the month! One example of why all of us work so hard at Town Cats From an adopter, who adopted Stripe in January 2005: We adopted Stripe ( or she adopted us) just last weekend. I just wanted to let you know what joy she has brought to us. It took her all of two hours to act like she has been with us her whole life. She has decided to ignore the bed we bought for her, and sleep with my 5 year old daughter-every-night. I can't tell you how happy that made my daughter!!! I thought her foster-family would like to know how Stripe has managed to wrap our entire family(including our DOG) around her paw. She is so loving, and spirited, and is the perfect fit into our family. Thank you for everything!

FOSTER HOMES Foster homes are always desperately needed at Town Cats to provide housing, food and love for the hundreds of cats that come through Town Cats each year. With kitten season every spring and summer, the need is greater than ever, especially if you can care for preweans. The following are categories from which to choose the type of kitty you want to foster: Age (prewean bottle fed, young kitten, teenager, young adult, older adult) Sex (male or female - always spayed or neutered if over 10 weeks of age) Number (one single kitty, a small litter, a large litter, multiple cats/litters) Special Needs (Treating sickness, recouping after surgery, socializing ferals. One of our long-time volunteers, Rashmi, bottle-feeding a baby kitten In general, foster homes provide food, water, litter and love. Town Cats provides any medical needs, and permanent supplies (litterbox, toys, scratching post).
KENNEL ASSISTANT/SHELTER CARE Town Cats opened its shelter facility in early 2000. We need responsible people to come in the morning - the earlier the better - to feed, change litter, clean, and care for the cats and kittens. Also, in the evenings, we need people to care for the cats and put them to "bed". This would be great for college students with afternoon classes, or adults with the time and love to devote to our wonderful felines. The cats and kittens need your help!
FERAL COLONY CARETAKER Feral colony caretakers are responsible for traveling to feral cat colony locations and providing food, clean water and protection from bad weather for the cats that live in the colony. Some caretakers build elaborate shelters for their feral cats to live in, while others use a discarded board to protect the food/water station. Some colonies are fed every day, while others only need to be checked twice a week. Caretakers are also asked to keep a log of the cats that are a part of their colony, and assist in the trapping, neutering and re-releasing of the cats to their colony. Some friendly colony members will be placed in permanent homes through our adoption program. Town Cats maintains colonies in Gilroy, Morgan Hill and south San Jose, and always needs volunteers to maintain existing colonies, or to assist with the establishment of new colonies, as needed.
PET FAIR ASSISTANT Our pet fairs are the best tool we have for getting our kittens and cats shown to the public for adoption. We hold pet fairs every weekend at the Pet Food Express on Capitol Expressway from 12:30 to 5pm on Saturday and Sunday, and at the Pet Food Express on Stevens Creek from 12:30 - 5pm on Saturday only. We also hold pet fairs at various other locations whenever possible (see www.towncats.org/meet.html). We would like to expand our pet fair schedule and have consistent fairs at these other three locations, but we need more volunteers to work the fairs in order to make this a reality. Assistants at the pet fairs help with cage maintenance (providing food/water/litter for the cats up for adoption), talk to potential adopters about the cats up for adoption, answer questions about Town Cats and cats in general, and pass out literature as needed to visitors to the fair. New volunteers are always paired with more experienced pet fair volunteers until they are comfortable dealing with the cats and potential adopters alone.
CAT SOCIALIZER We currently have a few teenage and adult cats who need a little more one-on-one time with a volunteer to become more comfortable being touched and held. This can be done as a new foster home situation, as time spent at the site of the current foster home for the cat, or at our shelter for the cats residing here. Instruction on methods will be provided. Flexible hours.
TRAPPING PROJECTS	There are several locations in the Gilroy, Morgan Hill, and south San Jose areas where trapping is needed to control feral cat populations. Training is available for volunteers interested in helping with this important job. Most trapping will need to be done from Sunday to Thursday, so that the trapped cats may be taken to the vet for spay/neuter, testing and vaccinations.
CAT TRANSPORT	Do you enjoy driving and meeting new people? Then this may be the position for you. We currently need people in the San Jose and Gilroy area who are able to transport cats from private homes to veterinary offices for spay/neuter surgeries. We provide this as a service to those people who are unable to take their cats into the veterinary office themselves, but who wish to have them fixed.
FUNDRAISING	Do you have a knack for talking to people? Do you enjoy planning events and coming up with ideas? We are always looking for new ways to get our message out there, and get the funding we need to help the 1000+ cats that come through our doors each year. So, if you have any suggestions and the time to implement them, we'd love to hear from you!
CLEANING/ORGANIZING STOCK	Do you enjoy cleaning and/or organizing? We are currently looking for individuals who would be interested in helping clean transport kennels and traps, launder playpen bedding, and organize donated items.
ASSISTING WITH WEBSITE/NEWSLETTERS	We can always use extra assistance with the website. Tasks include updating the adoptable kitties once or twice a week, as well as any other additional changes as needed. You should be willing to devote several hours a week, and have your own computer, copy of Dreamweaver, and some sort of photo editing program. This would be great for anyone who already knows basic web maintenance but wants extra experience, or just wants something to do! We also need assistance with the creation of newsletters. Creative talents or somebody with experience with a design program (such as Quark Express or Adobe FrameMaker) is requested. We'd like to do newsletters up to 4 times a year, but at least assistance twice a year would be extremely helpful!