John Boone, a wildlife biologist previously interviewed on CCP , joins Stacy to discuss new research on how we can use the tools we have to manage cat populations more efficiently and more effectively. This particular study was conducted by a group of people connected with the Alliance for Contraception in Cats and Dogs (ACC&D) and used computer modeling and simulation tools to predict the outcomes of various community cat management scenarios. John and Stacy discuss the methodology of the s...
Dec 24, 2019•22 min•Ep. 331
In this episode, Stacy is joined by Lizz Whitacre, founder and CEO of Pawlytics, a technology solution to help rescues manage their paperwork and gain insights from their data. Pawlytics is also expanding into the TNR/community cats space in an effort to use technology, data, and innovation to drive lifesaving efforts for community cats. Stacy and Lizz discuss how Pawlytics came to be, and how its affordable fee structure operates. When Lizz got started working on this project, it seemed to her ...
Dec 17, 2019•28 min•Ep. 330
Valerie Sheppard, Director of Professional Development & Credentialing at the Association for Animal Welfare Advancement (AAWA), joins Stacy to discuss what the AAWA is all about these days, including details on their Learning Center. Valerie created the Learning Center when she joined the AAWA in 2018, and it offers a variety of webinars (live and recorded) and online classes, most of which are free. Valerie wanted to make sure people from anywhere could access learning opportunities anytim...
Dec 10, 2019•20 min•Ep. 329
Meagan Larrea is a cat mom and cat lover who works as a civil engineer by day. The rest of the time, she runs Joy 4 Cats, a growing project that puts together toy and treat baskets for shelters to give away to new adopters. The program began in the fall of 2018 when Meagan heard about a local shelter with an overflow of adult cats looking for homes. As a creative way to help, Meagan created adopter baskets to bring joy to cats and to give people an incentive to adopt—and it worked! Since then, M...
Dec 03, 2019•21 min•Ep. 328
fostering, which she initially began doing through local shelters, she has discovered a deep passion for TNR and advocacy and now works independently to take in, care for, spay/neuter, vaccinate, and adopt out cats and kittens. Ashley got involved in fostering kittens after she lost her father to suicide, and she talks with Stacy about how much fostering helped her and her mom through the grieving process. Ashley is a big believer in the fact that fostering can be great for your mental health an...
Nov 26, 2019•24 min•Ep. 327
Isa Peraza Martinez began her career at the APSCA as an animal caregiver at the organization's adoption center. Today, she serves as Community Cats Outreach Manager. In this role, she delivers monthly TNRM (trap-neuter-return-monitor) workshops, held in conjunction with several other organizations in New York City, and she serves as the primary point person for feral cat concerns from the NYPD. Isa and Stacy discuss what the TNRM workshops consist of, and how things have changed in New York City...
Nov 19, 2019•22 min•Ep. 326
Dr. Kimberley Khodakhah (better known as "Dr. K.") runs Vetopia, a mentoring, wellness, and coaching business serving veterinarians. With 23 years of experience as a veterinarian herself, Dr. K. knows the business inside and out—including the fact that the animal medical field can come with incredible stresses and challenges. She mentors new and recent veterinary school graduates to help them develop skills and to facilitate success during their first few years of practice, and she also coaches ...
Nov 12, 2019•21 min•Ep. 325
Sally Williams, who previously chatted with Stacy on CCP Episode 104 , is a cat behaviorist and the founder and director of the Brodie Fund. She joins Stacy to talk about her newest effort, the Feline Fine Project, which aims to educate cat guardians and offer solutions in order to get more cats in for annual veterinary exams each year. Sally shares with Stacy that 55% of owned cats don't see a vet annually and 9% will never see a vet in their lifetime. The Feline Fine Project aims to change the...
Nov 05, 2019•26 min•Ep. 324
Colleen Bray, Director of the Boone County Kentucky Animal Shelter, has seen a lot of change with regards to cats in her time in animal welfare. She has worked in many roles in the field, and she joins Stacy to share not only her own shelter's success stories but also the cumulative success of the northern Kentucky region. In 2011, Boone County Animal Shelter had a cat live release rate of 26.5%. In the fall of 2012, they began an animal control-administered TNR program, and by 2013, their cat l...
Oct 29, 2019•19 min•Ep. 323
Anna Skaya, the CEO of Basepaws, joined Stacy last year on CCP Episode 213 , and now she's back to update Stacy on everything that has happened in the past year—including a successful appearance on Shark Tank! Basepaws is a simple, at-home DNA test for your cat that can give you an idea of the breeds your cat has in its DNA, and if your cat is a carrier for certain genetic diseases. According to Anna, Basepaws is laser-focused on cats, and the Basepaws test represents the first time that so many...
Oct 22, 2019•21 min•Ep. 322
Chelsea White is a host, writer, producer, comedian, and cat enthusiast. She currently hosts the Bravo digital series "Adulting by Bravo," a weekly Facebook live talk show called "What a Delight with Chelsea White," and the dating podcast "Ghosted Stories." She is also the creator and host of the "cat-pawsitive" web series "Show Me Your Kitty." In this CCP episode, Stacy talks with Chelsea about how she came up with the concept for "Show Me Your Kitty," and Chelsea describes some of her favorite...
Oct 15, 2019•19 min•Ep. 321
Shelly Simmons has worked for Greenville County Animal Care, the largest open-admission shelter in South Carolina, for twelve years now. She sits down with Stacy to talk about how, in the last four years, through the implementation of a variety of community cat programs, the shelter's cat intake has decreased from 9,000 cats annually to under 3,000 a year. Most of this was accomplished by offering free spay/neuter for all community cats in Greenville County. A county resolution supporting commun...
Oct 08, 2019•30 min•Ep. 320
Tabitha Kucera, a presenter at this past January's CCP Online Cat Conference, joins Stacy to discuss low-stress cat handling, clicker training, and more. Tabitha is a registered veterinary technician and a certified cat behavior training consultant. She is also certified in feline-friendly handling by both Fear Free and the Low-Stress Handling University. Tabitha has her own company, Chirrups & Chatter Cat Behavior Consulting and Education, along with a dog-related company, Positively Pawsit...
Oct 01, 2019•25 min•Ep. 319
Jenny Hart, a Brooklyn-based travel writer and mom to cat Rajah, is quickly becoming a cat travel expert. Soon after adopting Rajah as a kitten, it became clear to Jenny that he needed more stimulation than life in a New York City apartment could provide. Jenny began training Rajah to walk on a harness and leash shortly thereafter. Since then, the pair has traveled together on planes, trains, and in cars to nine U.S. states and Washington, D.C., with more travel ahead in their future. In this ep...
Sep 24, 2019•23 min•Ep. 318
In this episode, Stacy sits down with Will Zweigart, founder of Flatbush Cats, a nonprofit focused on reducing the outdoor cat population in central Brooklyn, New York through TNR and rescue work. Flatbush Cats teaches TNR classes and offers support and resources for trappers. They are also launching a mobile spay/neuter clinic pilot program to support low-income residents, a project done in partnership with the Toby Project . Stacy & Will talk about the work Flatbush Cats does and the organ...
Sep 17, 2019•25 min•Ep. 317
Preston Tobery, an expert at "maker technologies" like 3D printing, is the founder of Adaptive Tech and Consulting, a small business that makes adaptive technologies for special needs animals. Preston came to this specific work through several remarkable interactions with the Kitten Lady (Hannah Shaw) and two of her foster kittens, Chloe and Badger. The success of the technology Preston designed to help Badger with his megaesophagus, the Mega Feeder 3000, convinced Preston that he should start a...
Sep 10, 2019•20 min•Ep. 316
In this episode, Stacy talks with Siri Zwemke, author and founder/executive director of the Siamese Cat Rescue Center. The organization has been in operation for over twenty years, utilizing over 900 volunteers to save over 13,000 cats in that time. Siri has also just published a book, Rescue Meez, about her experiences running the nonprofit and rescuing cats over the years. Siri and Stacy discuss how Siri came to start Siamese Cat Rescue Center, how decreasing shelter populations have affected ...
Sep 03, 2019•20 min•Ep. 315
Jayne Sage began doing TNR when she moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico around 2002. After TNRing over 70 cats in her own neighborhood, she began looking for ways to help in other areas of the city and before long, she was a major advocate for TNR citywide. In this episode, Jayne and Stacy discuss how TNR advocates, working in conjunction with the city of Albuquerque, were able to decrease the city's feline euthanasia rate by 99% between 2009 and 2017. Some of this was accomplished through Best Fri...
Aug 27, 2019•23 min•Ep. 314
In this special episode, Stacy talks with Moshow the Cat Rapper about teaming up with Arm and Hammer's "Double Duty" campaign. Moshow wrote and created a song and video for the campaign, and if it gets two million views on YouTube by October 31, 2019, Arm and Hammer will donate $10,000 to ACCT Philly and to the Cat Adoption Team in Oregon . In addition to chatting about the Double Duty campaign, Moshow talks very personally with Stacy about the loss of his beloved cat Tali and how he is handling...
Aug 17, 2019•13 min•Ep. 312
In the second part of this two-part episode, Stacy talks more with Betsy Banks Saul, this time about her new business venture, a franchise of house-call veterinary practices called Heal House Call Veterinarian. Betsy began thinking about this idea around 2013, and her top priority was to increase the quality of life for animals and for their people—including their veterinarians. Around this time, Betsy found herself frustrated and saddened by the fact that her own pets' veterinarians seemed less...
Aug 13, 2019•15 min•Ep. 312
Betsy Banks Saul, a co-founder of Petfinder, and founder of a new business venture, Heal House Call Veterinarian, has been working with animals since she was a teen. She has a background as a park ranger, with an interest in forestry. In the first part of this two-part episode, she talks with Stacy about the path that lead her from that world into developing the Petfnder.com software with her ex-husband in 1996. Since that time, Betsy estimates that Petfinder.com has had over two million adoptio...
Aug 06, 2019•33 min•Ep. 311
Some of the content you enjoy will be releasing at on a different day of the week. Starting in August, the podcast will be released on Tuesdays instead of Saturdays. (However, being available for download on Apple Podcasts , Spotify , Sticher or wherever you listen to podcasts, means that you can listen whenever you'd like!) Meanwhile, the blog will be posted on Thursdays instead of Mondays. We hope this change makes it more convenient for everyone to learn how to turn their passion for cats int...
Aug 03, 2019•1 min
Stacy is once again joined by Dr. Rachel Geller, who has previously appeared on CCP Episode 18 and Episode 146 . A certified Humane Education Specialist and Cat Behavior & Retention Specialist, Rachel is celebrating the launch of her new book, Saving the World One Cat at a Time. Rachel tells Stacy that she hadn't really entertained the idea of writing a book until the Boston Globe featured an article about her work. Shortly afterward, Nancy West, a Globe columnist, contacted Rachel to ask if...
Jul 27, 2019•20 min•Ep. 310
Amanda Jones, a lifelong cat lover and self-described "totally sane cat lady," talks with Stacy about opening the Sunshine Kitty Catfe in St. Petersburg, Florida this fall. They get into the details of how the café will operate, as well as how Amanda came to be interested in cat cafes. At the age of 8, Amanda had her first experience as a "cat whisperer," in which she charmed a stray kitten at her father's office into coming to her. That kitten became Amanda's first pet cat of her own, and a lif...
Jul 20, 2019•18 min•Ep. 309
Stacy chats with Mary Chromek, who has been fostering neonatal (bottle baby) kittens for over 10 years now. A cat person since she was a child, Mary found that cats really helped with her depression and anxiety, and as she got older, she decided to give back by fostering for local organizations. She soon realized there was a real need for bottle baby fosters, and learned everything she could about this specialized area of foster care. Mary and Stacy discuss some specifics around bottle baby care...
Jul 13, 2019•19 min•Ep. 308
Steve Lawrence, an award-winning filmmaker previously interviewed by Stacy on CCP Episode 178 , returns to CCP to discuss the documentary film he co-directed, The Cat Rescuers. The film premiered in October 2018 at the Hamptons International Film Festival, where it won an award for "giving voice to the voiceless." Since then, Steve and his production company have set about making the film available for community screenings that can be used as fundraisers for rescue and TNR groups. This can be do...
Jul 06, 2019•22 min•Ep. 307
Stacy sits down with Dr. Sara Pizano (a previous CCP guest on Episode 56 , Episode 171 , and Episodes 246 and 247 ) to discuss Dr. Pizano's new book, The Best Practice Playbook for Animal Shelters. The book is a result of the more than 100 assessments Dr. Pizano has done at shelters around the country as a Team Shelter USA consultant. She realized that the shelters she was working with were all struggling with the same issues. More importantly, she realized that the solutions needed to decrease ...
Jun 29, 2019•25 min•Ep. 306
Peter Wolf, previously featured on CCP Episode 74 , joins Stacy again, this time to discuss a newly released research paper that he and Dan Spehar (CCP Episode 240 ) have co-authored. The paper, titled "Integrated Return-To-Field and Targeted Trap-Neuter-Vaccinate-Return Programs Result in Reductions of Feline Intake and Euthanasia at Six Municipal Animal Shelters," has been published inFrontiers in Veterinary Science, an online, peer-reviewed journal. For this paper, Peter and Dan pulled a very...
Jun 22, 2019•24 min•Ep. 305
Scott Giacoppo (previously interviewed by Stacy on CCP Episode 25 ) has been involved in animal welfare since 1989. Among other roles, he has worked as an animal control officer and a special state police officer for cruelty investigations. He currently serves as the Director of National Shelter Outreach for Best Friends Animal Society. In this role, Scott oversees the development of life-saving efficacy and sustainability for animal welfare agencies across the United States. He & his team p...
Jun 15, 2019•26 min•Ep. 304
In this episode, Stacy talks with Jackson Cunningham, founder of Tuft + Paw, a modern cat furniture company. Jackson and his girlfriend and business partner both have had cats all their lives, and describe themselves as obsessed with cats. After a trip to South America in which they observed stray cats being treated like pests, they swore that if a business opportunity came along that allowed them to help the stray cat community, they would jump on it. Fast forward a few months, and Jackson and ...
Jun 08, 2019•23 min•Ep. 303
