The Newest Craze: Kitten Rental. All The Cool Kids Are Doing It!

Why Kitten Rental?

1) Because SOMETHING in the bay area should be affordable to rent.

Unlike Air B n'B, we promise our kittens won't drink that bottle of wine you were saving...

You want $4,000 for a 150 square foot 'studio'? Why does that look so much like a broom closet? What do you mean parking and bathroom facilities aren't included?

Not only is kitten rental free, we'll also give you all the supplies necessary to take care of your rental kittens. All you have to do is feed them, love on them, clean up after them and raise them to not be little feline miscreants for a few weeks. Easy peasy. We even have a lovely two hour orientation that will show you the ropes and we'll give you the phone number of a nice person you can call if you have questions.

2) Because kittens are adorable for a few weeks. When they're not, you give them back.

I want the power to evict these little buggers before they shred my curtains.

If you didn't hear, kittens are actually from hell. That's the bad news. The good news? The little muffins that are available through our rental program are pretty small to be raising hell. Yes, they might shred things and yes, they still do use the bathroom but on a much smaller scale. Plus they're way easier to contain. By the time they reach the age of mass destruction, you return them and we send them on to their forever homes.

3) Three words: tiny little poops.

No backhoe required for litterbox cleanup. 

In all likelihood you will receive more than one rental kitten. They do best in groups. The good news? Kittens under two pounds create teeeeeeensy little poops. Yes, there will be poo. Yes, kittens are pretty much born litter trained so it will be contained. And yes, even if there is an accident, it will eensy weeny. Poop is never cute but if a case could be made for cute poop, kitten poop would probably be the winner.

4) HOLY DOG, THE ADORABLE!!

Shleeeeeepies.

There is absolutely nothing to be added to this photo to make a point.  Except maybe this:

This kitten is so adorable we actually want to eat it. 

'Nuff said.

5) Oh yes: you're saving lives.

I's can have forever home?

Kitten rental is a really nice way of saying 'kitten fostering'. By having foster homes available, we can take kittens that are too young to be safe in a shelter situation. We help out other shelters that don't have foster programs but also receive underage kittens. Without foster homes, we can't take these guys. And if we can't take them, then hope is lost for a lot of them.

Because cats are seasonal breeders (#truefact!) kittens pile in all at once over the warm months. People 'renting' a few kittens (even if you just do it once) allows us to expand our capacity beyond what our walls can hold. All levity aside, we need you.

This is super easy: just look at our calendar for feline foster orientations. Show up. Bring your elderly neighbor, the stay-at-home dad down the street, your aunt who talks to her houseplants because she's lonely, whomever is responsible and cool enough to lend a hand. But just come. Together, we've got this. Let's see you there.

And because this is our blog, we don't want to leave you on a down note. So have another adorable kitten-rental meme.

Ma'am, your rental kitten.

And maybe a picture of these little nuggets, too.

We can come home with you for a little while? 

(Just a wee quick clarification: we don't euthanize for time or space. All the little muffins that are here are safe. We do help out overcrowded shelters that are out of options and don't have the resources to run a foster program. Our ability to help them - to go in and pull these guys out - is dependent on having fosters available. The more homes we have, the more of them we can pull out. We want more homes to bring more kittens to safety. Which is where you come in.

Please don't hate on shelters that don't have foster programs. It takes resources - time, staff and funding- to run a program. We're super lucky. Our supporters and community are awesome and we have those resources. There's no 'good' shelter or 'bad' shelter here. Just a problem and folks and organizations working together for a solution. And that's good stuff.)