RAPS Helps Out

Vancouver Island cats travel to the Mainland for procedures.

The RAPS Animal Hospital recently provided seven spay and two neuter procedures to animals from an animal rescue organization on Vancouver Island.

The RAPS Animal Hospital is celebrating its seventh birthday this month – it opened to great fanfare on Family Day in 2018 – and one of the greatest sources of pride since opening has been our ability to help other animal organizations throughout BC and even further afield.

These spay and neuters were just an example of how the facility, in Richmond, has been able to have a reach far beyond our immediate community.

Beverly Archer started Cat’s Cradle Animal Rescue in 2005. It’s located in the Victoria area and serves southern Vancouver Island.

Beverly is modest about her groups’ achievements.

“We are not huge — we probably adopt out 300 to 400 cats every year and a few dogs here and there,” she said.

That sounds like a world-changing number to us! That’s 300 to 400 families every year whose lives are enriched by the addition of a four-legged friend. For the animals, it is truly a life-changing experience.

Most incredibly, all of Cat’s Cradle’s accomplishments are possible through fostering. While Beverly has a large property with multiple outbuildings where she temporarily houses animals, it is the volunteer fosterers who care for the vast numbers of animals who the group helps each year.

“We’ve got a good reputation and we’ve got a good base of volunteers,” she says.

Of course, there are what she calls “long-term fosters,” animals that are unlikely to find a forever home and who are fostered more or less permanently by devoted volunteers. Every year, a few of Cat’s Cradle’s less-adoptable animals are transferred to live at the RAPS Cat Sanctuary – our “Kitty Club Med” in Richmond.

Like RAPS, Cat’s Cradle raises funds through social enterprise. They have a fabulous thrift store in Sidney-by-the-Sea that helps fund the organization’s work.

Her group works extensively with communities, including First Nations in the area, to address feral and stray cat populations.

Dasha

Also like RAPS, Beverly recognizes that animals recognize that animals recognize no human-made borders. We share the belief that where an animal lives should not determine whether an animal lives.

“We help out Prince Rupert from time to time and we’ve gone to Manitoba and helped out a couple of groups in Manitoba,” she says, adding that they are trying to help out animals affected by the catastrophic wildfires in Los Angeles.

“I even got contacted by a lady in Iraq who flew a cat to us,” Beverly continues. “I helped a lady in Saudi Arabia. She sends one or two cats here and there to us. I feel like I’ve really made some friends over in these countries.”

Beverly gets annoyed with people who say, “Well what about our local animals? Why aren’t you helping them?”

“I am helping them!” she replies. “I’m not saying, ‘No, I can’t take you because I’m taking this cat from Timbuktu. I don’t say that.”

Moreover, Beverly personally pays all the transportation expenses out of her own pocket for animals brought in from out-of-town. No donated money pays for these travel expenses.

Minnie

The cats who came to RAPS Animal Hospital were transferred to the Mainland because the small vet clinic Beverly uses on the Island was backed up. Two of the cats came form a home facing economic challenges.

RAPS is delighted to help other rescue agencies in need – and Cat’s Cradle is thrilled with the help!

“It’s a great relationship,” she says. “Everybody there is just so super-helpful. They help me out as much as they can.”