NORTH HUNTINGDON, Pa. — Thirty-five cats were rescued by two local animal shelters from a Latrobe home on Monday that the shelters called an extreme hoarding situation.
“The ammonia level was so strong in the house they had headaches at the end of it,” Hannah Novak, of All But Furgotten, said about the rescue teams at the home.
There was black mold on the walls — and the place was a mess.
“[There was] feces everywhere, just really garbage all over the place, just a true hoarding example,” Novak said.
The cats they rescued had many physical injuries as well as trauma, making them a bit skittish for the rescuers.
“They probably will have some sort of internal parasite, the ammonia burns from living in their own feces, and some of them are longer hair cats, a lot of them have severe matting which is going to need to be groomed and properly cleaned,” Novak told Channel 11′s Andrew Havranek.
About half of the cats are at the All But Furgotten shelter, the other half are at Ninth Life Rescue Center. There are still more at the home they’re trying to trap.
“Over the last couple days people have gone and picked up the cats that have been trapped and they have been brought back to us,” Novak said.
Novak said they’re working to get rid of fleas and parasites, and working to clean the matted hair, which can be painful to the cats.
“Once that’s done, getting them fixed, getting they spayed and neutered so they don’t have to go through breeding or inbreeding ever again,” she said.
There is no criminal investigation underway at the moment, but adult protective services and code enforcement are involved.
The cats have a while to go, but will be up for adoption.
If you would like to help the shelter care for these animals and the other animals they have, they are looking for donations and other help.
You can call the shelters at the numbers below:
Ninth Life Rescue Center: 724-217-4257
All But Furgotten: 724-382-7178
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