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So, I arrived bright and early last Sunday for the SPCA cat neuter/spay day. My intention for the day was to be there doing one of the easy peasy jobs, like watching the cats in the recovery area as they came out of their anesthesia to make sure all was well before they went home.

Instead, I ended up in the pre-op room, where we (me, another volunteer and two vet techs) took cats out of their carriers and got their weight, temperature, heart rate and respiration. After subjecting the cats to those indignities, we gave them an injection to help them while they were anesthetized and put lubricant into their eyes to keep them moist during surgery. Then we moved them to the surgery rooms (one for boys and one for girls).

This was not the easy peasy job I had planned for. Cats, as any cat owner knows, aren’t the calmest of souls when everything is going their way. Put them in a small carrier, in a strange environment, alongside other strange cats and it’s easy to see how very recently we removed them from their wild lifestyle. Things moved fast and the work was hot and tiring and it wasn’t long before I was a sweaty, fur-covered mess. But on the positive side, time did fly.

One of the most gratifying things to see during the day was the number of younger cats that were coming in for surgery. The first time I volunteered for one of these events, it seemed like we were getting older cat after older cat. Now, don’t get me wrong, any neuter is a good neuter, but it was great to see younger animals being neutered before they could contribute to the overpopulation problem.

At the end of the day, a total of 110 male cats and 17 female cats were neutered and spayed. Time for a huge thank you to the Bakersfield SPCA for fund raising and hosting the event, the veterinarians, vet techs and volunteers who were there to help, all donating time on their day off to do so.  It was a great effort by all who were involved, and I can’t wait to do it again.