SCRANTON, Pa. — St. Cats and Dogs runs a citywide operation out of the former Nay Aug Zoo, spaying and neutering feral cats and adopting out others.
The volunteers say they've made an impact in controlling the city's feral cat problem over the past few years, but they haven't been able to spay or neuter since early March after being declared nonessential.
"This could possibly explode again, and hopefully, we'll be going back to work in a few weeks with the spaying and neutering. We're hoping anyway that the governor will be letting us do that," Joanne Davis said.
One of the consequences has been an unprecedented number of new kittens coming in for adoption.
St. Cats and Dogs is taking care of more than 40 kittens at the moment while the volunteers themselves are taking on new measures to protect themselves from the virus.
Only two volunteers are allowed inside the zoo at once.
"A lot of pressure, we are overfull. It's a lot more work when you have a lot of kittens, and some of the mothers are feral, so they take longer to take care of. It does put a lot of pressure on us. And supplies, we go through a lot more supplies," Sheri Sakosky said.
The silver lining of the pandemic has been that more people are adopting adult cats freeing up much-needed space.
"We've had between 35 and 40 adoptions in the last six to eight weeks, which is terrific because we are able to take more kittens in then," said Davis.