Cat cafés pop-up on campus to promote overloaded kitten adoption centre
By: Christina Klysh
Students had some feline fun as they held and played with kittens at Red River College Polytechnic’s first pop-up cat cafe at the Notre Dame Campus on Feb. 29.
Miss J.La’s Fur Babies Cat Café and Adoption Centre, who supplied the event’s furry guests, is over capacity and hoping to find new homes for its feline residents.
“Right now we’re completely full, unless fosters step up I can’t take any more cats.” said Jennifer Laferriere, owner of the adoption centre. She says her cafe is currently closed to public visits because they have too many cats.
“We have over 100 cats in care but just over 65 in our facility. Because we’re not open to the public, adoptions are slower.”
Laferriere says she keeps some cats in her home long-term because of health issues, and also takes in temporary fosters.
Laferriere says she opened the centre with her daughter Carly in 2016 after dreaming for years of starting her own rescue. Some of the rescue’s current feline residents have come from friends of Laferriere who could no longer care for them, but many are found on the street, surrendered, or found through posts on social media.
“If I see people posting free kittens, if I can, I’ll offer to take them, because you never know where free kittens will end up, that’s our concern,” said Laferriere.
Emma Pischke, a Child and Youth Care student, says being around the cats at the cafe reminded her of her pet cat back home in Northern Manitoba.
“I’m currently struggling with a lot of things right now, but I found it was a really nice, relaxing, fun experience.” Pischke said.
It was also a good opportunity to spend time with classmates, said Jesiree Palag, a first-year Early Childhood Education student, who brought a Polariod camera to take pictures of her classmates with the cats.
“We’re here to make some memories together,” Palag said.
