When you walk into the cattery on a Wednesday afternoon, you will be greeted by up to 30 cats and four welcoming women!  Janice Mack, Karen Putnam, Tracy Tureson, and Julie Appler love getting to know all of the cats that stay in the cattery until adoption.  

They appreciate each of the distinctive personalities of their feline friends.  In addition to providing hours of socialization and affection, the women on this shift deep clean all of the cattery litterboxes and give the cattery a weekly dose of “fresh air!”

Julie is the newest member on the shift; she started volunteering in May.  Since Julie does not have any kitties at home, she loves coming in each week to be with the cats in the cattery.  Julie often finds herself staying past the end of her shift and subbing on other shifts as well.  Julie keeps active in her spare time, walking, swimming and playing Mahjong.

Tracy loves cats and has certainly found a way to be around them as much as she can since she started volunteering a year ago.  Tracy also volunteers on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings in house cats and is foster mom to kitten Amber.  She enjoys spending time with her kids and volunteering at her daughter’s school.

Janice and Karen have both been volunteering with WSHS cats for more than 20 years.  In that time, they have seen a lot of changes, the biggest and best being the addition of our free-roam cattery.  They appreciate that WSHS volunteers have always jumped in to take care of whatever needs fixing at the shelter.  They also marvel at the number of cats that have been helped in “our little ol’ building.”  Karen spends as much time as she can with her grandchildren and loves the movies while Janice likes reading, landscaping and travelling.  Janice is mom to Moonstruck, her black velvet short-hair beauty, and foster mom to recent cattery resident, shy Chelsea.

The Wednesday afternoon shift also hosts the Little Friends’ Bridge High School program where students with autism gain job experience.  The Business Development Specialist for this program is thankful for the opportunities that this shift gives to her students, saying that the women on the shift “radiate love and passion for the animals.”

Janice, Karen, Tracy and Julie all started out volunteering at the shelter for the cats, but they have stayed to be around fellow animal lovers.  Stop in to chat with them when you are here on Wednesday!