Although I know shelters have these policies, I’m pretty skeptical that there’s any sort of run on black cats as decorations around Halloween. Sure, around Easter there are idiots who buy bunnies or chicks for their kids, and people adopt dogs like Dalmatians when movies come out, unaware of the realities of the breed; but I’ve traveled in a lot of goth circles, and I’ve never heard of anyone getting a black cat just in time for Halloween. Are there any documented cases of this occurring? Enough such cases that it’s a real problem?
(FWIW, you could document it via analysis of shelter records at shelters without such policies: if it’s a real problem, there should be some sort of uptick in black cat adoptions before Halloween, accompanied by an uptick in returns after Halloween.
I have six cats. My Raven Blackitty is the only one who manages to escape on a regular basis. She was feral when I found her and I don’t think she’s very happy indoors. Still, yesterday my roommate and I were careful not to let her out. It’s probably silly but she was safe, however angry she was with us.
The number of people that harm animals in very cruel ways is much larger than most would think. Very difficult it do a survey and be all scientific & stuff.
What some people have seen first hand most here would call fake.
Mans inhumanity knows no bounds.
Two of our 8 cats are black. Big boys & will fight if pushed, really teen aged brats for all practical purposes. One was a feral trap that we put a lot of effort into and the other was about 30 minutes from death from lack of food & water and had a broken back that we think came from being thrown out a window because of where he was. Took us three years but he is now my cuddle buddy.
My neighbours in the basement suite (bless their hearts) set up a zillion halloween props, disco lights, 2 smoke machines, a ghetto blaster playing MJ’s Thriller (please no…), and sat at a table in costume and handed out candy. There was also much jumping out from behind tree with a witch’s cackle to scare the poor little blighters.
Our black cat was immensely intrigued, going out to join the party several times during the evening, or watching from behind a hidey bush. He slept hard that night. Good cat times. Striped cat is still traumatized and not impressed.