On Monday, September 28th, our evening volunteer arrived to the rescue at 5 pm and found a box outside our door, taped shut. The note on the box read "stray pregnant mom found with a litter already. They've been living in bushes by my home and I dont want to see them die this winter. Please take care of them. From, concerned Citizen."

The thing is... The box was empty, with a hole in the side.

The mama and her unknown amount of kittens had broken out of the box, and were nowhere to be found.

Dumping cats is considered animal abandonment, which is a federal crime in the United States. But beyond being a federal crime, dumping cats inside a taped shut cardboard box on a 75 degree day when the shelter was closed is extremely inhumane. While the human who left them might have had the intention of helping them, this is NOT the way to help cats. Being taped in a cardboard box on such a warm day is not humane, and the fact that they escaped... they were now in more of a dangerous situation than if they stayed outside the owners home until they could talk one-on-one with us about options.

But, what was done is done. The cats and kittens were missing somewhere outside our facility, and that didn't sit right with our Director, Abby. So on September 29th, Abby put all of her work on hold and headed outside our facility to look for them. To the north west of our facility is brush along the complex, so she started searching there. Then she went behind the buildings to the north of our facility and looked there, but ultimately ended up at the metal storage racks for the Industrial Factory that is across the parking lot from our rescue. Its full of metal wracks, pallets, and lots of places to hide, so she thought she'd start going through and looking under pallets.

After looking under wooden pallets, Abby made her way into the metal racks and instantly saw something move under one. She approached slowly, and the little black and white baby let her grab him! She scooped him up, and carried him back to the building, where Nancy got him in a carrier with food and water right away. Abby grabbed another carrier and headed back to the racks to look for more. If there is one, there is surely more there too, right?!

Carrier in hand, Abby decided which way to continue searching the racks and as soon as picked a direction... she spotted them. Clearly the mama cat, on the bottom of a rack with two babies sitting next to her. Abby couldn't believe it, and in the vlog she's repeating "Oh my God! Oh my God!" She called Nancy to come down and join her while she ran around the far side of the racks to get closer to the cats.

As Abby came around the corner, mama cat came right up to her! She wanted pets, attention and love right away! She is skinny, so we're not entirely sure she is actually pregnant, but we'll get that checked by our vet soon because Abby scooped her up and put her right into the carrier!

With one baby safely inside and mama cat inside the carrier, Abby knew the mission wasn't over because she saw 2 other kittens with mama just moments ago. She rounded the corner where they were laying together and saw them both take off under pallets. Abby shook a bag of cat treats, and a fluffy gray and white one appeared, eager to eat. She put a few treats on the ground right infront of her, and the little fluffy kitten walked right up... and Abby grabbed it before it even knew what was happening! She plopped the fluffy baby in the carrier with its mama, and Nancy came to collect the carrier from Abby and take them to join the other baby back at the rescue. Which left one last baby....

The last Baby sent Abby (and Nancy, who later joined her) on a wild goose chase through the metal racks. Abby was crawling on her hands and knees under metal, climbing over metal beams, squating and going through the wracks, and squeezing between palets and metal beams. Eventually, the baby went under a pallet where it only had 2 exits- toward Abby, or toward Nancy, but was too far under it for them to reach the baby. So Abby tricked it, using the wet food that Nancy had brought. She set the bowl up right outside the enterance to the baby was, and kneeling under a metal bar, stayed crouched right next to the bowl and just waited. As soon as the baby came out for some food... Abby just grabbed it's scruff (usually, we don't condone using the scruff, even on kittens, but in this case- Abby needed to make SURE it didn't get away, and since she was stuck on her hands and knees by a bar above her body, she had to crawl out on her hands and knees from the spot they were at with the baby in her hands, so scruffing was the only way in this situation!)

If you lost count, thats 3 babies and one mama caught! The note on the box left outside the door didn't specify how many kittens there were, so we don't know if we got them all. With the rescue's live trap being borrowed, Abby and Nancy asked in our volunteer group chat if anyone had a live trap, and one of our volunteers (shout out to Michelle S.!) brought their live trap over. They set up the live trap just incase there was any babies that Abby didn't see before leaving for the day. Later, at 9pm, as our evening volunteer was leaving from her cleaning shift, she checked the live trap and... sure enough! A FOURTH FLUFFY GRAY AND WHITE BABY WAS IN THE TRAP! Our volunteer got the baby out of the trap and reunited it with their siblings and Mama (and Abby will name it tomorrow, once she can see if its a boy or girl!) The live trap is reset, incase their is a 5th!

Our rescue is 100% full. In fact, we didn't even have a cage to keep these babies in. After over an hour of searching and over a 40 minute chase with the final kitten, Abby had to move cats around in the rescue to free up a cage to fit mama and her babies... We made it work for now but truly, we don't know how we're going to juggle the housing situation in the rescue as cats get fixed. We are not over our state limit, but we are now surpassing the number we feel comfortable with housing inside the rescue. Besides a few recovery cages for sick cats to be housed in, every cage is full in our building.

Mama, who we named "Rebel," is now safely inside the rescue, being housed with her son, who we named "Jett," and two daughters; the fluffy gray and white baby "Breezy" and the baby that didn't want to be caught, "Zippy." (The fourth baby, which was found after Abby wrote this fundraiser, has yet to be named.... will update this page when its named!) They were so hungry, and mama is still nursing the babies, but also were drinking water and munching on kitten food as soon as we put them in a cage together. We will let them decompress together for the rest of the week, and if mama Rebel allows, Abby will attempt to bathe the babies. Next week, we will get them scheduled to be seen by our vet. They will all get their PVRCC shots, and flea and tick treatment as well as any additional vet care they may need. Once Rebel weans her babies and her milk dries up, she will get fixed. We will work on socialization with the babies and once Jett, Breezy and Zippy hit 4 lbs, they will get fixed and move into a free roam room with our other 5 kittens, where they will eventually go up for adoption. They have a long road until they get to that point though.

They were dumped, they escaped, they fended on their own in unknown territory, and now they're finally safe.

These babies already have had so many people in their corner: Our volunteer, Gail, found the box. Abby found mama and her first 3 babies. Our volunteer Becky found the 4th baby in the live trap. And now YOU have a chance to be apart of their rescue story. We are kindly and humbly asking you for assistance for caring for Rebel and her babies.

We barely have room. But we have to make it work. We simply will not abandon them. We are dedicated to giving them the future they deserve, the care they deserve, and for finding them the happily ever after they deserve. Abby will figure out the space. Our volunteers will keep their environment clean, cuddle the babies, and teach them what "love" really means. We need your assistance with giving them the vet care they desperately will need.

We are asking for $300 per cat, this will provide each cat: Flea and Tick prevention, dewormer, 3 rounds of PVRCC vaccines (each,) fund their future spay/neuter surgery, provide them their rabies shot, fund their microchip, and give mama and one kitten a FIV/FELV test at the time of their fixing.

$1 toward their care is $1 we don't have. Even just $1 tells these babies "I know you were left in a box, but your future is bright."

Abby may have been the one who climbed through metal racks to catch them, but you will be the one to give them the ability to have the life they deserve. Thank you for considering donating toward Rebel and her babies care and being apart of this crazy rescue story!

If you'd like to watch the Tik Tok of the vlog, including footage of Abby finding and catching Rebel, Jett, Zippy, and Breezy, you can view the Tik Tok here. If you are local to Frankenmuth Michigan and would like to help care for the cats in our care, like Rebel and her babies, please visit our website, we'd love to have you join our volunteer team!

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Dumped in a box, escaped the box, and then caught outside our rescue- now they need YOUR help!