Article by April Lynn King
As COVID vaccines attain extra individuals, extra of us once more dream of journey overseas. Many search for new horizons to discover, however I left my coronary heart in Montenegro, and may’t wait to return to go to the nice and cozy, welcoming individuals and the various pretty neighborhood animals—particularly the cats.
Montenegro shares the gorgeous Dalmatian shoreline with Croatia and Albania, throughout the Adriatic Sea from Italy. Kotor is a favourite metropolis for a lot of cruise ships. In addition to breathtaking surroundings, its historical walled metropolis is a UNESCO Heritage website and Lonely Planet ranks Kotor among the many prime 10 Cities for Cat Lovers. That was a part of what drew me there with my associates in 2018.
The unhappy actuality we discovered was that the coast of Montenegro, together with Kotor, is over-populated with cats. The end result was that the exhausting efforts of many locals to feed and look after the cats couldn’t start to maintain up with the wants of the ever-growing inhabitants.
Most stunning to us was that there was no spay-neuter program for the cats or canines! Montenegro was a member of NATO and it aspired to hitch the EU. But it was nicely into the twenty first century with out a spay-neuter program for any of the neighborhood animals—canines or cats—in your complete nation!
What’s a traveler to do? Ask your Airbnb hosts to assist begin a program, after all! We began with a easy settlement to lift funds to sterilize 10 cats after which “see what occurs”. The result’s a bunch known as “Kotor Kitties.”
In the 2 and a half years since my first go to, Kotor Kitties has celebrated necessary milestones:
- Volunteers and accomplice veterinarians have sterilized greater than 3,300 cats!
- Kotor Kitties was established as a nonprofit group (501©(3)) within the United States (2019)
- A separate UK charity, additionally Kotor Kitties, was registered (2020)
- We now work with accomplice veterinarians in Kotor, Herceg Novi, Niksic and Podgorica, to spay and neuter cats in central Montenegro in addition to alongside the coast!
- Kotor Kitties volunteers span the globe, from Kotor to Panama, Seattle to Niksic, Podgorica and Budva to Great Britain.
- We’ve acquired grants supporting our work from SNIP International (TNR gear), The Pollination Project (web site design and translation), Cold Noses Foundation, LUSH, and the Susy Utzinger Foundation for Animal Welfare (spay-neuter surgical procedures)
You can discover details about the work of Kotor Kitties, beautiful photographs of the neighborhood cats, and knowledge on how cat lovers may also help from wherever on the planet on our web sites: www.kotorkitties.org (English) or www.kotorkitties.me (Montenegrin.) We may also have a Russian-language web site out there someday in 2021.
Several outlets in Kotor declare to assist the cats. There is just one present store, Danijela’s Cats, that really helps with common meals and medicine for a big inhabitants within the surrounding areas. When you go to Kotor, be sure you ask round for her store—which is normally surrounded by cats! (It was beforehand known as Kotor’s Cats.)
Visitors can have the added enjoyable of serving to us Trap-Neuter-Return cats in Stari Grad (Old Town) and the encompassing space. Kotor Kitties has traps and carriers out there for check-out, and our vet is only a 10-15 minute stroll.
Even in case your time in Kotor is simply too brief for cat-catching, you may assist us spay and neuter the cats by on the lookout for our informational flyers, which embody a QR code for donations, or for our donation canisters.
Post-pandemic vacationers must also search for Kotor Kitties Calendars on the market within the pet outlets and present outlets in Kotor, Tivat, Herceg Novi, and Budva. The calendars make nice, light-weight and easy-to-pack souvenirs or items for family and friends! All proceeds after printing prices go to spay and neuter the native cats. We use Montenegrin print outlets to assist increase the native economic system. The calendars we provide in outlets throughout “vacationer season” might be dated for the next yr. For instance, 2022 calendars would go on sale this yr.
Cat lovers can observe us on Facebook for info on future campaigns to make spay-neuter surgical procedures extra reasonably priced and accessible for residents of Montenegro by eradicating the 21% tax, to ascertain a foster and adoption program for orphaned kittens, so as to add higher respiratory vaccines to our spay-neuter program, and to create a “restoration room” for sick and injured cats in Kotor needing longer veterinary care: https://www.fb.com/kotorkitties.
Our favourite Montenegrin journey website, Montenegro Pulse, has at all times donated a portion of their proceeds to animal welfare in Montenegro. The web site now affords a stunning article that includes Kotor Kitties and the kitties in Stari Grad, Kotor, together with different info on animal welfare in Montenegro.
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