You are one of many people quietly doing real animal welfare in BC. As so often, you took up this work after working or volunteering at an SPCA, thinking that you would be doing animal welfare, only to find that you were expected to do pest control.

Until recently, the official SPCA policy was to kill every feral cat. AAS was told by the North Vancouver SPCA when we started feral cat rescue in 1998 that the SPCA would immediately kill every feral cat we brought to it. In fact, it would rent or lend traps to individuals to trap nuisance cats to be brought in to be killed. This is unmistakeably pest control, not animal welfare. AAS has been told many times of cats with ear tattoos clearly indicating ownership, being killed along with all the other cats:

"Our organization is based on animal welfare and does not prohibit the killing of animals if that is the only solution. In fact, a quick and painless death is better than a slow and painful death, as experienced by some feral animals that are neutered and released to fend for themselves."

Since November 2005, BC SPCA feral cat policy is to "support the concept" of trap/neuter/release. We welcome the SPCA to tell us in what way it is supporting this real animal welfare work.