Posted on 15/12/2019/by Ng Yi Shu/ in fundraising

New Year Wishlist 2020

New Year 2020 Wishlist

Many of you cat angels, volunteers and supporters have given to us in the last year, and we really appreciate it!

This year, we’re hoping that you can help us do more for the cats at Love Kuching Project!

Here’s what we’re wishing for this Christmas and New Year:

This year we’re prioritising our wishlist according to what we need the most!

As some of our wishlist items (like IKEA furniture) can only be purchased in-person, we will include instructions on how to donate or purchase these items for us!

If you’re keen on giving us something on the wishlist, reach out to Yi Shu (our Marketing and FLOAT manager) by emailing assist@lovekuchingproject.org for more details!

Email Yi Shu

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Food and supplies

Do you know that our cats go through nearly 42 cans of food and 2 bags of litter a week?

At our peak capacity each shelter cat will eat nearly a can of food a day, and while the amount and type of canned food varies depending on dietary restrictions, we try to keep to our high-quality usual brands, like Wellness Core and Zealandia.

Polypet has been offering reduced prices for us for the past two years through their Save the Strays campaign — and we’re really grateful for their help in setting up a donation page just for us!

Take a look at what we will need below:

Zealandia Venison Pate / Zealandia Brushtail / Wellness Core

Our cats eat up to six to eight cans of food a day, and as our pet supplies partner Polypet is discontinuing the sale of Addiction, we are gradually switching over to Zealandia Venison Paté or Brushtail!

We use brands like Zealandia and Wellness as they are grain-free and contain no artificial preservatives. Brands like Zealandia and Wellness are also lower in sodium – that’s great for the cattery kitties that have chronic kidney disease as it is easier on their kidneys!

We’re still using Wellness Core, which is especially helpful for cats like Hitam — Hitam’s ulcers mean that she can’t eat food that is too dry.

If you would like to donate canned food to us this Christmas and New Year, do head to Polypet via the button below – they’ve set up a page just for us as part of their Save the Strays campaign!

Donate via Polypet

picture credit: Aristocat/YiHu

Aristocats Pine Litter

Our cats use up to two bags of pine litter each week — that’s a lot of poo to clean up!

We primarily use pine litter as it disintegrates with moisture, and it is biodegradable — the natural smell of pine also does away with any smell of pee. For cats with open wounds, however, we use hypoallergenic tofu litter to aid in their wound recovery.

If you would like to donate pine litter to us this Christmas and New Year, do head to Polypet via the button below – they’ve set up a page just for us as part of their Save the Strays campaign!

Donate via Polypet

Furniture and storage

Like last year, we’re hoping to replace our clinical care trolley, which was made out of pine. It’s accumulated more than four years of wear and tear, and has been exposed to the bodily fluids and dirt from cats in the last four years and needs to be replaced.

We’re also hoping to replace the shelves that have been at the center of the cattery this year! The center black shelves have been with us since we moved into the cattery in 2015, and they’ve been an iconic part of the cattery. But they have been suffering from uneven bulging and signs of rot from water seeping into the particleboard and fibreboard and need to be replaced.

As we are purchasing most of these through IKEA – if you’re keen to donate, contact Yi Shu, our FLOAT manager by emailing assist@lovekuchingproject.org and we can make relevant arrangements for you to help us buy these items!

EKET shelves

($125 at IKEA)

This item has been donated by Joyce! Thank you Joyce!

We have a good number of student and ad-hoc volunteers who come by the cattery (up to 3-4 ad-hoc volunteers might come by at any given day, which means a maximum of 28 ad-hoc volunteers a week) — many of them may carry bags from work or school.

Currently, we have a really fancy coat stand — that, like many of the stuff that’s at the cattery, has begun to degrade. We’ll replace the coat stand with these EKET shelves that are just of the right size to place bags and shoes from volunteers. This would hopefully help reduce clutter when volunteers and visitors come by!

A cat tree

This item has been kindly sponsored by one of our donors, who requested to be anonymous.

We have a good number of cat trees that have come and gone through the cattery — most of which we had to replace because of wear and tear!

The Hagen Catit Vesper Cubo tower is one of the trees that we’re currently looking at — it has an enclosed area for cats to hide and rest in that is still accessible for humans when we need to give the cats medicine or bring them to the vet.

KALLAX shelves

These items has been sponsored by the Lai Family and Clare & Noelle Png! Thank you so much!

Our current shelves are suffering from uneven bulging and signs of rot from water seeping into the particleboard and fibreboard. In replacing the shelves, we’re also hoping to include inserts and boxes where we can store items like plastic bags, dry food, collars and treats without having them collect dust — or worse, become a haven for roaches.

We’re also hoping to reconfigure our shelving so as to maximise vertical space for our volunteers! If you’re keen, reach out to us and let us know how you can help.

FLYTTA Kitchen Trolley

This item has been sponsored by one of our donors in memory of Noisy! Thank you!

We were hoping to use the FLYTTA kitchen trolley as a replacement for our current medical table, which is made out of pine.

Even though pine has been a relatively good and durable material so far, we’re concerned that the porous nature of wood will allow fluids like blood to accumulate.

While we clean properly and regularly, there’s only so much we can do to keep the current medical table clean. Having a stainless steel clinical care table means an easier time for our volunteers, who can wipe down the messes that cats might make!

Shelter equipment

This year, we’re hoping to get key fire safety and security equipment for the cattery.

Fires are serious business — and while we have functioning sprinklers installed with our building and two fire extinguishers which our Facilities Management volunteer maintains — we need a quick-response plan for our volunteers in case of a fire in the building. The Love Kuching cattery is not manned 24/7, and enhanced monitoring equipment will help guard the cattery from intruders too.

We’re also hoping to get a pet brooder — an enclosed incubator where we can ensure that cats like (the now departed) Sky can remain warm in times when they need critical care. The incubator can also serve as a comfortable space for us to apply oxygen and nebuliser therapy for a cat that needs critical respiratory care.

Like before, feel free to contact our FLOAT manager, Yi Shu by emailing assist@lovekuchingproject.org to make relevant arrangements for you to help us purchase these items!

A CURADLE pet brooder

($1,390 for the MX-B90N, estimated)

After the passing of cats like Sky and Quiety this year, we are hoping to get a pet brooder for use as an intensive care unit for critical situations in which we can offer oxygen therapy, nebuliser treatment, and a warm, controlled environment for cats that will need it.

The brooder will be immensely useful for a range of situations – from treating cats with respiratory failure to soothing and comforting cats during the late and final stages of palliative care, so we no longer have to incur expensive costs of boarding them at 24-hour vet clinics.

We already have an oxygen generator and a nebuliser, both of which we can plug right into the CURADLE pet brooder for cats to receive treatment.

As the brooder cannot be purchased on the retail market, we are currently making arrangements with vet equipment suppliers to purchase the pet brooder. We currently have two sponsors who are keen on helping us with purchasing the brooder, but because of how much it costs we welcome more donors who can help! Email us below for details.

Email Yi Shu to arrange for donation

Google Nest smoke detector

This item has been sponsored by Timothy (@timnga)! Thank you so much for your kindness!

Fire is our worst enemy, and given that the cattery isn’t manned 24/7, it is important to have a smoke detector so volunteers who live nearby can respond quickly.

We’re hoping to get a Nest-enabled smoke detector so key volunteers can get alerts immediately; they will be able to respond to any alerts and contact the SCDF if necessary. The hope is to have a volunteer be present within 10-20 minutes of any emergency, if possible.

D-Link Google Assistant compatible camera

This item has been sponsored by Timothy (@timnga)! Thank you!

With the smoke detector, an upgraded camera would allow us to have real-time remote updates on what is going on at the cattery, which can be useful in instances where immediate updates are needed.

The D-Link DCS-8525LH camera would be an upgrade to our current setup, a ProLink camera that has poor streaming speeds.

While our current ProLink camera is appropriate for its current job, it is immensely slow with updates and a very hard to navigate user interface. And while it records video locally, chunks of footage can often be missing, and volunteers will have to travel to the cattery to retrieve footage, something that may not be done in an urgent situation.

The new D-Link camera should still be able to record locally but also allow trusted volunteers to remotely monitor the situation in case of an emergency.