Frequently Asked Questions

Can't find the answer to your question? Contact us!

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has both detailed information and a FAQ for pets.

Also read the Alley Cat Allies COVID-19 Response page.

Alley Cat Allies website explains that although there is evidence that cats can catch COVID-19 from people, the reverse is not true. More information is available on the No Kill Advocacy website.

After recent major disasters, such as Hurricane Katrina, there is a much greater awareness of needing to provide assistance for people's pets. Please check with your local food pantry to see if they have a supply of cat or dog food. It may not be the brand your pet is accustomed to, so remember to transition them rather than suddenly switch to a new food to avoid upsetting their system. Most imporant, make sure your pets have enough water available as a change in diet may alter their needs. Remain alert to changes in your pet's behavior after a diet change and contact your veterinarian if you have any concerns.

The Fresno area pet food pantry is Halo Cafe Pet Food Pantry. If you need help feeding your pet in Fresno, please call their 24 hour info line at (559) HALO-717 for schedule and location information.

Most stay-at-home orders grant exceptions for taking care of animals outside your home. Check the order for your location. For most colony caregivers, feeding is a solitary exercise that does not require interaction with other people. Take all of the recommended precautions to stay safe, especially if you cannot be sure nobody else has touched the feeding station bowls, trays etc. Be sure to wash/sanitize your hands before touching your car and its contents after feeding.

Most imporant of all: Do not stop feeding your colonies without making some arrangement for someone else to take over feeding!

Unfortunately, we are likely to be facing a worse-than-usual kitten season because spay/neuter surgery options are severely limited during the stay-at-home orders. One option with which your veterinarian may be willing to assist is non-surgical contraception for female cats, which has been available in other countries but hasn't been given much consideration in the U.S.A. yet. The primary challenge with community cats is to ensure the intended cat alone consumes the medication, but the risk of potential harm to other cats is thought to be low. Please review the article and then have a discussion with your veterinarian. It may save lives during this especially challenging situation.

If you adopted your cat or dog from The Cat House on the Kings, contact us immediately at (559) 638-8696.

Please be sure your cat (dog) is microchipped and that the microchip is registered! Microchipping is an inexpensive way to ensure that you'll be reunited if your pet is found. In general, animals who have some form of identification, such as a microchip, collar or a collar and tag, may be held a bit longer for owners to come forward.

Please note: The immediate search advice below is primarily relevant to lost cats. The remaining advice about posting flyers, filing reports etc. is relevant to both cats and dogs.

Follow the steps below to help find your cat (dog). Also check this article on forming a recovery action plan.

  • Don't panic. Cats are territorial, and generally do not wander far from their home. If they are outdoors for the first time or outside their territory, they'll be scared by their new surroundings and will hunker down until they feel it's safe to move about. Cats generally will NOT move around during the day, but will search for food and move about at night, when it is cool, and they won't wander far if food and water are close by.
  • Anchor your cat to your home by putting canned food and fresh water outside your back door (away from the street!). If possible, leave food in your adjoining neighbors' yards also. If ants are a problem, put the bowl of food in a larger bowl filled with water. Also put out a towel or blanket with your cat's scent on it and leave a light on at night.
  • Check hiding spots. Cats occasionally get shut into places that are open temporarily, so check your neighbors' garages, sheds, storage areas, and crawl spaces.
  • Alert your neighbors by posting on Nextdoor.
  • Make up flyers with your cat's picture and a font large enough to be read from a passing car. Use our free tool to make a lost cat (lost dog) flyer or create your own. Print the flyers on bright colored, eye-catching paper. If it is likely to rain, put the flyers inside sheet protectors that you can get at any office supply store. Be sure that the opening in the sheet protector is at the bottom so water doesn't get to the flyer.
    • Start close to home, then distribute the flyers in an ever-widening radius. Post the flyers where people will see them from their cars when stopped, or while out walking.
    • Hand-deliver flyers to your neighbors, and enlist their help. If they have indoor cats, your cat may be drawn to their house.
    • Put flyers in mailboxes or at front doors. It is possible someone nearby has been feeding your cat and is unaware that he is lost—this happens quite often.
  • File a missing cat (dog) report with your local, public animal shelter. It's best to go there in person (take a flyer with you and ask them to post it). Shelters also maintain lists of animals who have been found, and those who have been picked up injured or dead. To locate your local, public animal shelter: For cities or counties not listed above, do a Google search using the search terms "animal control" and your city.
  • Upload a photo of your cat or dog to the @PetcoLoveLost database and the groundbreaking technology will scan for a match to help find them.
    Shelters and rescues upload the animals they have taken in throughout the day. Check out their poster.
  • Report your lost pet on PawBoost
  • If your pet was lost in the area around Fresno, CA, check our list of found animals.
  • WALK your neighborhood late at night when it is quiet and call for him. While walking, tap the edge of a can of cat food with a fork or rattle a bag of dry food. Lost pets often hide during the day.
  • Slowly DRIVE around your neighborhood late at night—cats often recognize the sound of a car. Important: When calling for your cat, wait for a lull in any traffic so that your cat is not tempted to run to you and into the path of traffic!
  • If someone contacts you and says they've seen your cat, ask if you can put canned and dry food in THEIR backyard to anchor him to that location. Then hang out and call his name—he won't wander if he has food and feels safe.
  • Post flyers at local vet clinics. Someone could have picked up your cat (dog) and taken him to a vet.
  • Talk to your neighbors, and especially children! Children are often outdoors and ride their bikes around, and thus know what's going on in the neighborhood. They are often the first ones to notice a stray.
  • Post ads in:
  • You may need to trap your cat. A lost cat is most likely very scared to be away from home, so don't expect him/her to come running to you. Once they've been anchored with food, but back away when someone approaches, then trapping may be needed. Contact a local rescue group or shelter which will either have humane traps to rent or volunteers who will help you trap your cat. Trapping cats is usually not too difficult, but can take patience. Do not leave traps unattended for extended periods of time!
  • BE PERSISTENT! Someone recently once emailed us about their lost cat. They followed the above steps and found their cat 4 WEEKS later—a neighbor down the street had been feeding their cat, and didn't know he was lost. Another family had lost their cat, and found it by walking the neighborhood at night while calling their kitty's name. So please continue leaving food out, posting flyers, and canvassing your neighborhood. Persistence is key—hang in there!
  • Once your cat (dog) is home, consider updating their flea treatment to avoid a problm in your home.

The formal hold period is six business days (M-F), but that period may be reduced under certain circumstance, so don't delay!

You can read the CA Food and Agriculture code on hold periods for cats and dogs online.

If you have found a kitten, your next step may mean life or death. Follow this advice from Best Friends Animal Society, Alley Cat Allies and AdoptaPet.com.

You can also use our free tool to create a flyer for your found cat (found dog).

You can also report your found pet on PawBoost.

If you think you cat has been poisoned, call the ASPCA Animal Poison Control Center at (888) 426-4435.

There is a $55 consultation fee for this service.

Be ready with the following information:

  • the species, breed, age, sex, weight and number of animals involved
  • the animal's symptoms
  • information regarding the exposure, including the agent (if known), the amount of the agent involved and the time elapsed since the time of exposure.

Have the product container/packaging available for reference.

Please note: If your animal is having seizures, losing consciousness, is unconscious or is having difficulty breathing, telephone ahead and bring your pet immediately to your local veterinarian or emergency veterinary clinic. If necessary, he or she may call the APCC.

See below for a list of .

The ASPCA has compiled an extensive list of plants which are either toxic or non-toxic to cats, dogs or horses. They also have pictures to help you identify the plants. For your convenience we provide some easy-to-use lists which have been derived from the ASPCA information. Always double-check that you are looking at the right list!

The Cat Fancier's Association has a list of plants poisonous to cats.

CPR for cats and dogs is similar to CPR for humans. The procedure is described below or you can view a video demonstration. These directions assume the animal is unconscious and the risk of being bitten by the animal is not present.

  1. Remove any obstruction. Open animals mouth and make sure the air passage is clear. If not remove the object obstructing the air passage.
  2. Extend the head and give several artificial respirations:
    1. For large dogs: close the animal's jaw tightly and breathe into the nose. The animal's chest should rise. Give 2 breaths.
    2. For small dogs and cats you may be able to cover the nose and mouth with your mouth as you breathe. The animal's chest should rise. Give 2 breaths.
  3. Next perform chest compressions
    1. For large dogs you may be able to position the dogs on its back and compress the chest just like for humans.
    2. For small dogs and cats as well as large dogs with funnel chests, you may need to lie the animal on its side and compress the side of the rib cage. Alternatively you can position the animal on its back and press on both sides of the rib cage.
  4. The rate of chest compressions varies with the size of the animal
    1. Dogs over 60 lbs: 60 compressions per minute
    2. Animals 11 to 60 lbs: 80-100 compressions per minute
    3. Animals 10 lbs or less: 120 compressions per minute
  5. Alternate breaths with compressions The ratio of compressions to breaths should be approximately the same as for humans - 30:2 Continue doing this until the animal responds or begins to breathe on its own.

We have compile a page of resources here.

We recommend you try to find a new home with family, friends or co-workers first (people you already know best) and then try the Adopt a Pet or Get Your Pet services (see below) if you still need help. If you rehome your pet privately, we strongly recommend that you charge a reasonable adoption fee instead of giving your pet away free to someone you don't know to better ensure the potential adopter is serious about taking care of your pet.

AdoptAPet.com will help you find a new home for your pet by making a listing available through their nationwide adoptable pet database. Make sure you have some good digital photos of your pet that show both his/her looks and personality. Just click the graphic below to get started.

Get Your Pet (getyourpet.com) is an online community to connect people needing to rehome a pet with potential adopters.

If you originally adopted the cat from The Cat House on the Kings, you may return the cat at any time at no charge just by contacting us to arrange the time and place.

If you did not originally adopt the cat from The Cat House on the Kings, this is on a case-by-case basis. We prefer to try to assist in solving the individual situation or suggest ways you can find a new home for your cat on your own. If this is not an option, you must contact Lynea for approval at (559) 638-8696 before filling out our online surrender form.

If you previously adopted the cat (or dog) from The Cat House on the Kings, there is no charge to return the animal.

For individuals the total charge to surrender a cat is $5000. As a courtesy and only if you live in California, we will accept monthly payments toward this total, provided that you have first paid a non-refundable deposit of $500 (for cats under 8 years old) and $1000 for senior cats (8 years and older). The minimum monthly payment for non-senior cats is $60 per month until the entire balance is paid (up to 83 months) and $75 per month for senior cats (up to 67 months). If the cat is unvaccinated or unaltered, there is an $80 fee in addition to the deposit.

Note: The full surrender fee is due and payable to The Cat House on the Kings even if the cat dies before full payment has been made. If the cat is adopted before all payments have been made, The Cat House on the Kings will consider the remaining debt to be paid in full and no further payments will be required.

Payment in full discount: If you pay the entire surrender fee at the time the cat is surrendered, the surrender fee will be discounted 10%. e.g. For a non-senior cat the discounted fee would then be $4500.

Yes! If you submitted your surrender form online, simply click here and enter your e-mail address to receive a secure link to look up your surrenders. Then you can make a one-time payment or set recurring payments through PayPal or Stripe.

No. The reason is that in exchange for the surrender fee we provide the service of lifetime care for the surrendered cat(s). Consequently, the surrender fee does not qualify as a tax-deductible donation.

We have a Surrender Exchange Program for qualified rescue organizations. Please read the terms and conditions. To become a Surrender Exchange Partner, please submit an application online.

Photos taken with a digital camera typically start out with several thousand pixels ('dots') in both width and height, so the whole picture consists of several million pixels. The corresponding data file for the picture can be several megabytes, even though the data has been compressed. The file size limit for a surrender photo is 250K bytes. To reduce the size of the file to meet this limit, you must reduce the number of pixels.

There are two steps to resizing a picture for the surrender form, both of which can be accomplished easily using a free online service called picresize.com if you don't have any photo editing tools on your computer:

  1. The first step is to crop the picture to remove unneeded parts. This means trimming the picture from each of the four sides to leave only the parts you want. For example, a picture of a cat sitting on a couch in the living room should be cropped to show just the cat, not the rest of the couch, the pictures on the wall behind the couch, or the rest of the living room.
  2. If the picture is still too large after cropping out the unneeded parts, a software tool can be used to scale the photo and reduce the number of pixels used to represent the image.

You want to end up with a picture which is about 800-900 pixels wide. The height of the picture will depend on the original width-to-height proportions of the picture after it has been cropped.

Unfortunately we are not able to offer boarding at this time. We regret the inconvenience.

Both ASPCA and HSUS offer tips for travelling safely with your pets.

Heathrow Airport in the UK offers a guide for international travel with your pets.

Check petsforpatriots.org before you deploy for resources to look after your pets while you are away.

Dogs on Deployment is a non-profit which promotes responsible pet-ownership and the military-pet community by providing an online resource for military members to search for volunteers willing to board their pets during deployments, training or hardships. Check out their flyer and follow them on Facebook. If you adopted from The Cat House on the Kings, please contact us about your adopted pet.

Guardian Angels for Soldier's Pet provides a foster program and other services for military, wounded warriors and veterans.

Yes, we can help with low cost spay/neuter surgery and vaccinations for cats and some small dogs. You can request vouchers that cover the cost of the surgery for a modest co-pay.

There are various estimates around the Internet for how many kittens can theoretically be produced by one unaltered pair of cats. The usual gestation period for kittens is just 59 days and a female can have several litters a year. In fact in the Fresno area there are reports of some cats having four(!) litters a year because of the warm climate. So to estimate the number of kittens who could be produced by one unaltered pair of cats, a number of assumptions must be made. There is no general agreement on the numbers chosen for the assumptions, so we let you choose your own and see the how they play out. Just use our handy calculator and try changing the numbers to what you believe to be most likely!

The "community" cats in your neighborhood, who don't have their own human guardians, will typically congregate in colonies where they find food. Some of the cats may be strays who have got lost and could be returned to their guardians. Others may be "feral" cats who have never been socialized to humans and remain fearful of close human contact.

The best way to help these cats is to establish a properly managed colony by the cats who are not adoptable, and finding homes for those who are adoptable or who have got lost and can be returned to their home. Then organize volunteers to provide food and fresh water for the colony on a daily or alternate day schedule. The volunteers and the cats will get to know each other. The cats will begin to appear as if by magic when they hear the sound of the volunteer's car pull up to deliver food!

TNR stands for "Trap, Neuter and Return". TNR is a program in which unsocialized and unadoptable cats living our communities are humanely trapped, sterilized so they can't produce more kittens, vaccinated, ear-tipped (to show they have been fixed) and then returned to where they were trapped so that they may continue to live out their lives in peace.

A full TNR program includes the proper care and management of a colony of cats: All cats in the colony are "TNR'd" and volunteers provide them food and water on a regular schedule so they come to know who is part of the colony, who needs to be fixed, who needs medical attention and so on.

Take a look at our TNR Basics guide. You can borrow humane traps from us for which we require a refundable deposit. IMPORTANT: You must make spay/neuter appointments for the cats you want to trap before you attempt to trap them. Otherwise you may be stuck with cats in traps and nowhere to take them to be fixed!

Yes. The Cat House on the Kings is a qualified 501(c)(3) tax-exempt charity. Our Tax ID is 27-0015288. Please note, however, that although donations are tax-exempt, in particular are not tax exempt.

Our recent financial statements are available online.

Our online donation forms include the option to opt-in to or opt-out of our mailing list with no default choice already made. Please see below for more information.

We are now offering Stripe as an alternative payment platform to PayPal. Just click the Stripe logo instead of the PayPal logo to make your donation.

The process for changing the credit card you use with PayPal is straightforward:

  1. Login to your PayPal account.
  2. Click on Wallet at the top of the window.
  3. Click on Link a card below the "+" in the "Credit and debit cards" section.
  4. Enter the requested information and click the Save button
  5. You will then need to confirm the credit card. This involves PayPal making a tiny charge to your card and then asking you to obtain a 4-digit code associated with that charge. To obtain the 4-digit code, login to your credit card account online and find the details of the PayPal charge transaction. Enter the 4-digit code to confirm your new card on the PayPal website.
  6. After confirming your new card you can remove the old card by clicking on Wallet again and then clicking on the old credit card.
  7. Click Edit below the credit card.
  8. Click Remove Card (beneath the Save button). Please note: If PayPal has a pending transaction associated with the old card, you will not be able to remove that card until the transaction has completed. See here for PayPal's online help with this situation.

To change your payment method for Stripe, use the Stripe Customer Portal.

If your subscription was set up through PayPal, login to your PayPal account and navigate to "Manage my subscriptions".

If your subscription was set up through Stripe, you can use the Customer Portal to manage your subscription.

We can send you a secure link to your Stripe Customer Portal.

It would be best to consult your estate-planning attorney about including a bequest to The Cat House on the Kings, a 501(c)(3) registered nonprofit organization, in your estate plan. This guide describes the decisions you will need to make.

You will need our name, address and tax ID:

The Cat House on the Kings
7120 S. Kings River Rd.
Parlier CA 93648

Tax ID: 27-0015288

Phone: (559) 638-8696

Please visit 2nd Chance 4 Pets for advice on making arrangements for your pets to be cared for after you are no longer able to do so. Their advice addresses both arranging for a caretaker to assume responsibility for your pets and the necessary financial planning to ensure your pets are well cared for.

The ASPCA website has a very helpful section on how to make arrangements for the care of your pets when you are no longer able to look after them.

Adopt-a-Pet has rehoming website with resources to help find a new home for for your pets when you are no longer able to look after them.

The ASPCA website has a primer on pet trusts, which are legally sanctioned arrangements that provides for the care and maintenance of one or more pets in the event of their owner’s disability or death.

This article on the LegalZoom website explains the benefits of a Living Trust.

Follow these steps:

  1. Establish a revocable Living Trust.
  2. Print just one copy of our Surrender Form.
  3. Complete all parts of the form except the individual cat details. i.e. make a generic Surrender Form.
  4. Work with your estate planning attorney to include a provision in your trust that:
    • Leaves $5000 per cat you would wish to surrender for The Cat House on the Kings surrender fee.
    • Provides for the veterinary fees associated with the required vaccinations, testing and microchipping as needed.
    • Provides for the expenses of the individual who will transport the cats (fuel, meals and possibly overnight lodging, depending on the travel distance).
    • Designates one or more individuals who will ensure the cats have been vaccinated, tested and microchipped prior to their surrender as required on the Surrender Form and then coordinate the surrender of the cats to The Cat House on the Kings.
    • Requires that only an individual known to you or your family transports the cat(s) to the sanctuary. (We have had the sad experience of someone being hired from a social media response who collected a cat and a fee for transporting the cat to us, but the cat never arrived and the transporter was subsequently unreachable!).
  5. Mail a copy of just the section of your trust document with the cat surrender details as described above and the signature page together with the completed generic surrender form to:
    The Cat House on the Kings
    7120 S. Kings River Rd.
    Parlier CA 93648

Please read our adoption process.

We are open 7 days a week, except major holidays, by appointment only. For adoptions, spay/neuter appointments or tours, call (559) 638-8696 (Option 1). (For all other matters, please see our contact page.) For adoptions, you must submit an online application and receive approval before making your appointment. If you plan to stay overnight in the area, several local hotels offer special rates for our visitors.

You may also visit our off-site adoption center at Petco, 4144 N. Blackstone Ave at Ashlan in Fresno. Call (559) 222-0228 for more information.

Yes, provided that your adoption application is approved. However, by choosing to travel from out of the area to The Cat House on the Kings to adopt from us you must agree to accept 100% of the financial responsibility for the care of the cat(s) and that if something does not work out with the cat(s), you will be responsible for returning the cat(s) to us safely at your expense. (We do not have the ability or financial resources to travel out of the area to retrieve our cats.) If this is not acceptable to you, please consider adopting locally.

Cat behaviorist Jackson Galaxy as a series of blog posts on Cat Introductions. The Humane Society of the United states has an online guide to introducing a new cat to your other pets. Please take a look and let us know if you still have questions.

Any dog who enters the property must be cat friendly. Most of our dogs are abandoned as puppies who "learn" cat respect by trial and error. We are after all, The Cat House, not The Dog House!

Lynea Lattanzio began taking in cats in 1992 (32 years ago).

We have a 12 acre cat-proof fenced property.

The property is enclosed by cat fencing: 6' chain link and 4' overhang with chicken wire netting. Chicken wire is also buried on both sides of the fence to prevent cats or dogs from digging out and predators from digging in.

Take a look at our Cats Safe at Home page for more information on Catification, Catios and Cat Fencing for keeping your cats happy and safe at home.

The sanctuary is home to an average of 700 adult cats. The number of kittens fluctuates according to the season.

Most of our cats are rescued from the streets of the local counties (Fresno, Kings and Tulare). We receive dozens of calls a week from the public asking for help in saving the lives of kittens, cats, dogs and puppies they find. Since we are unable to accommodate the 100's of thousands of abandoned domestic pets, we offer and . As a rule we try to only take in the cats and kittens that we can adopt out. That doesn't mean that we don't end up with a few unadoptables or resident cats, but as a rule we don't take in more and more cats every year.

Anywhere they want! There are at least 10 feeding and bedding facilities on the property. However, all are welcome in the 4,200 square-foot house.

The cat's 4-in-1 (FVRCP&C), Rabies and Leukemia vaccinations are brought up to date. The cat is also wormed and treated with flea preventative. Watching Lynea do all this at lightning speed on a very unhappy feral cat is something to behold! (See "" below.)

Newcomers are initially quarantined while they get acclimated to their new environment. (See next question.)

We have quarantine areas to keep new animals closely supervised in the event of stress induced illness. Some interact after a few days, some take months, some never adjust. Take a tour to see for yourself where they will live.

Like all other cats, ferals arrive either in carriers or traps. We use a small fishing net to capture the cat when the door of the carrier or trap is opened and they try to take off! This is enough to hold them still long enough to give the treatments. The cat is released back into the carrier or trap from the net to transfer them to the Pasture Project, our version of Ellis Island for newcomers.

Absolutely! Any animal entering our sanctuary is spayed/neutered (and vaccinated) promptly as needed upon arrival.

You can view our policy here.

We use Frontline Plus and/or Advantage Multi on the animals that we are able to handle. We use a food additive on all animals using the following recipe: 2 parts brewer's yeast to 1 part each of granulated garlic, food grade Diatomaceous Earth (not pool grade!) and L-Lysine. We heat about 4 cups of water in a microwave (8 mins) and then add a heaping spoonful of Better than Bouillon, available from Amazon (see below), Walmart, Target, Safeway, Lucky, Save Mart stores, among others.

Then we stir in ⅓ cup of the ingredient mixture, mixing it all thoroughly. Then we add it to a bowl with 2 13oz cans of cat food and around six cups of dry food (we use Halo) which are also well-mixed together and served on large trays. Since we feed hundreds of cats, this prepation is used a lot! The yeast and garlic are for fleas. The L-Lysine boosts their immunity and the food-grade Diatomaceous Earth kills internal parasites.

We spray Fipronil purchased in a concentrate on areas where the animals sleep plus we also sprinkle Diatomatious Earth on the sleeping areas (wears away the cuticle on the insect and is an holistic way to control parasites).

For more information on Diatomacous Earth, see diatomaceousearth.com, Amazon (see below) or saferbrand.com, among others.

No carpets! Floors are mopped daily with antibacterial detergent and bleach. Remember, if it smells like urine and feces, it is urine and feces. Enzymes are also used daily.

We have about 50 inside litter pans and several outside litter boxes. We also we rake the yard (approx. 1½ acres) daily.

Due to COVID-19 we are allowing visitors strictly by appointment only and following the State recommended guidelines. We continue to do adoptions by appointment only with all of the recommended safety precautions.

We'd love to have you come and visit. Come tour our facility, check out our adoptable cats and kittens and dogs, and talk with Lynea and our staff about The Cat House. If you plan to stay overnight in the area, several local hotels offer special rates for our visitors.

We are open afternoons 1pm-4pm 7 days a week, except major holidays, by appointment only. If you are considering adopting a cat or dog, you must submit an application online and receive an approval e-mail before making your appointment; our staff is very busy taking care of our residents and may not have the time to have you fill out an application and review it on-site. Tours are offered Thu-Sun only. Please call (559) 638-8696 (Option 1) for an appointment before coming by!

Please note: Tours are conducted weather permitting: If it looks like it will get too hot or it will be raining, we may need to reschedule your tour appointment. Our staff monitor the weather forecast and will contact you if necessary. You are still welcome to visit, of course. Just be aware that it is often over 100°F here in the summer.

The current weather at 12:30pm (PDT) is 100°F, 100% humidity and sunny.

(Real-time temperature/humidity from an on-site sensor, general weather powered by WeatherAPI.com.)

We get anywhere from 100-200 volunteers per year between our Fresno Adoption center located inside Petco and The Cat House shelter, one of the largest show of voulteers is at our twice a year Open House. We open the gates up to over 600 guests, with tours of the facility, one of the largest silent auctions you will ever see (over 400 items to bid on), a raffle, food, music and all the cats and dogs you could possiably ever want to pet or visit with along with about 2 dozen peacocks free roaming on the property.

No. We parterned with Petco Love (formerly Petco Foundation) to build the Fresno adoption center. Grants from Petco Love paid for the majority of the cost of construction and we lease the center back for $1.00 per year. We staff the center with one full time Cat House employee and several volunteers 7 days a week 8-10 hours a day. We do about 500 adoptions a year at our Fresno Petco adoption center.

Payroll for 45 employees. It takes many hours of labor to take proper care of the animals and to enrich the areas they live in, which enriches their lives. We are always working on ways to improve the property for the animals, building a larger play yard for the seniors, larger areas with trees and climbing post for the FIV ward, improving the ways we keep the areas sanatized and clean. Adding trees for shade, exercise and protection.

We currently employ 9 vet techs, housekeeping and office staff, adoption coordinators and a maintance crew. All employees are responsible for the care of the cats, starting with the vet techs and even the cleaners and office staff. With the number of cats that we have, we all have to take responsibily for their care.

Item Per Week Per Year
Dry Food 1500lbs 78,000lbs
Wet Food 1200cans 62,400cans
Litter 1000lbs 52,000lbs
Paper Towels 100rolls 5,200rolls
Laundry Detergent 10gal. 520gal.
Bleach 15gal. 780gal.
Dish Detergent 10gal. 520gal.
Large Trash Bags 200bags 10,400bags
Kitchen Trash Bags 400bags 20,800bags

Yes. We also submit more detailed data to the national Shelter Animals Count database and you can see our dashboard here.

Basic intake and adoption statistics are available on this website.

In the event that Lynea decides to retire or run away to join the circus, Tammy Barker, our Assistant Director will take over. Tammy has been a rescuer for many years and is intimately familiar with our operation. We also have many loyal employees who have been with us for 10 years or more, so we would anticipate a smooth transition.

Take a look at Jackson Galaxy's website as well as his books, toys and related products on Amazon.

Another behavior resource is The Cat Coach, Marilyn Krieger. She also has a good book on addressing behavior problems: Naughty No More!.

The San Francisco SPCA also has a number of cat behavior resources.

Cornell Feline Health Center has a comprehensive article on house soiling.

Completing this House Soiling questionnaire may provide you and your veterinarian with helpful information for diagnosing the cause.

FIP is no longer a necessarily fatal diagnosis! There is an experimental treatment which has shown great promise. Read the FIP FAQs and Petey's FIP Journey. For assistance in obtaining treatment, visit the FIP Warriors Facebook group.

There is active research at UC Davis. There are two studies on the wet form of FIP: Oral Antiviral Therapy and Combined Stem Cell and Antiviral Treatment. Additional resources are also available from UC Davis.

Read Jackson Galaxy's books on Catification for elegant ways to provide a rich environment for your cats.

[We copied this from a photocopied piece of paper with no source attribution.]

For some gardeners, cats and other animals are uninvited guests. One method of keeping animal visitors away is to offend their sense of smell. When cats encounter this potent mixture, they will associate it with your garden and stay away.

  • 3-4 garlic cloves, crushed
  • 3-4 chiles (Habaneras) chopped or pureed
  • ½ teaspoon dishwater detergent
  • 3 gallons water

Mix all the ingredients together and let it steep for 24 hours. Dribble the mixture around the garden every few days for two to three weeks. Soon your garden will be pet and pest free.

If we could afford it, we would use Scoop Away. Currently we use Scamp Scoop, which we purchase by the pallet.

To estimate your cat's age in human years, Purina has an online calculator. There are other estimators available on the Internet with some variation in the answers.

We can always use and appreciate volunteers. There is a wide range of options from kennel maintenance to fostering to fundraising. Please fill out our online volunteer form to tell us about yourself and what areas you would like to help with. Even if you do not live in the Fresno area, you may still be able to help us with fundraising, our newsletters, website and so on.

We always need financial help, so direct financial assistance or indirect assistance through fundraising is critical to our ability to provide a lifetime home for as many cats as necessary.

Yes! Follow us:

Facebook Twitter Threads Instagram YouTube TikTok

Simply post a picture on our Facebook page of one of your current cats who is sound asleep.

Please note: As a policy we will not include any cat who has crossed over the Rainbow Bridge.

Thank you for requesting donations for us!

Follow these steps:

  1. Start here to select your charity (us!).
  2. Enter your fundraising goal amount.
  3. Enter the date the fundraiser should end.
  4. Edit the title of your fundraiser, if necessary.
  5. Click "Create".

Facebook has its own help page, but it can be a bit confusing.

You can sign up for our mailing list online.

To change your mailing list preferences, you must request a link be sent to your e-mail address so we know it is you requesting the change. Request the link here.

If you previously received email from us, you were probably unsubscribed. This can happen for a number of reasons, sometimes automatically:

  1. Email we sent to you was rejected by your email provider. This can happen because:
    • Your email address is no longer valid.
    • Email from us was rejected automatically as spam/junk more than 3 times in a 4 month period.
    • Your mailbox was over quota more than 4 times we sent you email in a 4 month period.
  2. You marked a message from us as Junk or Abuse.
    We participate in "Feedback Loops" with a number of major email service providers, such as Google and Yahoo. With a Feedback Loop your email provider will send us an "Abuse Report" when you mark a message from us "Junk" or "Spam". Within an hour of receiving an abuse report, we automatically unsubscribe you to avoid sending you any more email you consider to be "abuse."
  3. You chose to opt-out of our mailing list when filling out a form on our website.

You can check your subscriptions online. Simply enter your email address and we'll email you a secure link to update your mailing list preferences. Your previous opt-in/opt-out status, if any, will be shown.

We do not sell or otherwise share our mailing list with any third party with the sole exception of conveying USPS addresses to the commercial printer that produces and mails our quarterly newsletter. Please see our Privacy Notice for additional information.

A Daily Voting Contest is one in which voters cast a vote each day while the contest is open instead of just one time. The winners are determined by the cumulative total of the votes they receive over the several weeks or months the contest is open.

The Cat House on the Kings primarily participates Shelter Challenge contests sponsored by TheAnimalRescueSite. In these contests votes are cast for a particular animal shelter or rescue (us, we hope!).

We monitor the Shelter Challenge contests page automatically and are alerted when a new contest is posted. If we determine we are eligible to participate, we post announcements on our social media pages and send a message to subscribers on our Announcements mailing list.

The easiest way to vote is to sign up for our . We also include a link to the voting page for the contest in our announcement social media posts and email.

You can subscribe to our Daily Voting Reminder mailing list and then voting takes just two clicks each day!

You will receive an email each day the contest is open. The email will contain a "Vote Now" button for each of the contests which are currently open. (There is very rarely more than one.) After you click the "Vote Now" button in the email, you will be directed to the actual voting page where you can simply click the "Vote" button to cast your vote.

Yes! Check out our online shop for shirts, hats, coffee mugs, etc. Certain special fundraising items, such as calendars, masks and tote bags are available through our "kiosk".

We periodically offer certain fundraising items for sale which generate a lot of orders for multiples of the same item and for which we offer special pricing which is not easily accommodated by our online shopping cart. We found that the most efficient way to handle these items is a virtual "kiosk" through which you can buy multiples of just a single item at a time. We have a pretty efficient process for packaging and shipping these items because they can be handled in batches unlike individual online shop orders which may include a variety of items. This saves our small office staff a lot of time.

We are generally happy to ship any of our merchandise anywhere the US Postal Service can deliver it, both domestically and internationally. However, there are some execeptions:

  • Post-Brexit, we are no longer able to ship to the United Kingdom. We do not have the resources to comply with the VAT collection and reporting requirements.
  • The USPS has suspended international mail to a number of countries due to restrictions related to COVID-19. Please check their International service distruptions bulletin for the latest information.

Each country has its own rules for taxing items arriving from other countries, both to generate revenue and to give an advantage to their own manufacturers. This tax is referred to as "import duty". We are not able to collect and remit taxes for any country other than the USA, so packages we ship internationally may be held by the local customs authorities pending payment of the required import duty. While we have only very rarely encountered packages being held, you need to be aware of the possibility when ordering items to be shipped internationally. What usually happens is that instead of receving your package directly, you receive a demand for payment of the import duty in order to release the package for delivery.

If you encounter a demand for import duties, please let us know ASAP so we can determine the best path forwards.

The Animal Legal Defense Fund and In Defense of Animals may be able to offer advice either directly or through a referral. Alley Cat Allies also has a staff attorney who is knowledgeable about cat issues.

The U.S. Department of Justice answers commonly asked questions about service animals in places of business.