Left, Ingrid Deacon, middle, Alise Antrobus and right Heather Tluczek
Cat Family Foundation wouldn’t be Cat Fam if our day didn’t start with a flurry of WhatsApp messages, updates on kittens, logistics for the next rescue, and of course, plotting revenge on the next set of unsterilised cats that need to be trapped (with love, of course).
Over the years, we’ve been lucky to have incredible mentors. They’ve taught us to be patient, how to bottle feed, work smarter, show compassion, and most importantly, how to survive in the sometimes brutal world of animal welfare.
We’re always learning: about cats, diseases, treatments, colony care and everything in between, to ensure our ferals are thriving, not just surviving.
This is serious, often stressful work. But the day it stops being fun or driven by passion is the day you hang up your trapping hat.
Like most rescue orgs, we’ve seen it all.
The start of something wild
Our story began in February 2020 when Alise got a hysterical call – kids were throwing kittens over a wall onto the highway. She made a desperate plea on Facebook, and Ingrid responded, tagging rescue stalwart Viv Jones: “We can make a mission of it!”
And in true South African style, when the gentleman we’d helped couldn’t pay us, he offered… homemade CBD oil. Ingrid swears it was “the bomb”. Alise? She settled for the samosas.
That little outing landed each of us with two extra cats in our homes. And since there were more kittens than laps to go around, we gently (read: relentlessly) convinced a few close friends that their homes could use a little feline love too. That’s how some of our first rescues found homes – with people who hadn’t planned on adopting… until we showed up with kittens.
This month, we’re celebrating five years in rescue – five years of thousands of kilometres travelled, hours of trapping, growth, friendships, and a lot of cat poop.
Meet the Crazy Cat Ladies behind the mission
Ingrid Deacon
Ingrid is our fierce (ehm, slightly wiser) team leader. If it moves and she sees goonies, she’s on it with a trap. Her passion is catching ferals like it’s an Olympic sport, and we suspect if there were a gold medal in trapping, it would already have her name engraved on it.
She single-handedly manages Aeroton’s sprawling business district, home to nearly 150 cats (and possibly a few more that think they’re still undercover). But her real superpower? Knowing everything about everything (and everyone). If you need to know something about something or someone, Ingrid is your go-to girl. She’s got a mental database that rivals Google and a contact list longer than your auntie’s grocery receipt.
Honestly, we don’t know how she remembers it all, but we suspect it involves a combination of instinct, strong tea, and hours of doing this with heart and grit.
Heather Tluczek
Heather joined in January 2024 after reaching out for help with a massive kitten population under the Strijdom Park bridge. Our first rescue together involved trapping kittens with a fishing net in an overgrown bush surrounded by… let’s say, less-than-pleasant human contributions. We MacGyvered tools and made it work – and still use that net to this day: a handheld fishing net reinforced with mesh and rope (perfect for hoisting the quick little Houdinis), and a long-handled fishing pole net for the slippery escapees just out of reach.
Heather is our kitten whisperer. Her two dedicated kitten rooms could make a 5-star hotel envious, complete with climbers, hidey spots, plush beds, and even a skyline catio.
She and her partner, Colin, brave the empty weekend streets of Strijdom Park to feed colonies and deal with the bizarre things humans do (like stealing a feeding station but leaving the chain behind).
Alise Antrobus
Alise does a bit of everything – trapping, fostering, admin, and marketing. Her colony, opposite a private school, started with a mom and two kittens. It’s now a family of seven, with a new tomcat whose manhood is on the eviction list.
She also drives us mad with her constant “great ideas” (usually involving spreadsheets, graphics, or 17 new traps), but we love her for it. If it needs doing, Alise will figure it out, even if it means chasing down paperwork, chasing down a cat, or chasing down someone’s lost sense of logic.
Getting Cat Family Foundation tax-exempt status with SARS took three years, but Alise did it, so we now proudly issue S18A certificates to donors.
All three of us hold full-time senior jobs – yes, we’re crazy, and yes, we love it.
Our favourite things (and not-so-favourites)
Favourite things:
- Seeing a feral in a trap
- A 2-for-1 special (two cats in one trap!)
- Cats greeting us at feeding time
- Kitten kisses
- A perfectly healthy poop in the litter box
- Adoption updates years later
- Donations!
Not-so-favourite things:
- “I can’t keep my cat anymore.”
- “Sterilising will change my cat’s personality.”
- Watching a kitten die helplessly
- And the cruel things people are capable of doing to cats
Boots on the ground (and torches in hand)
Strijdom Park has become our second home. Many nights you’ll find us cruising the streets with torches and tins of pilchards, scouting our next sterilisation candidates. Trust us – there’s always another cat.
And when we’re not patrolling the streets, we’re answering the daily chorus of: “There’s a stray here!” or “Feral spotted there!” – driving all over Joburg like feline first responders, assisting mere mortals in estates and suburbs with their “problem cat children”, usually the result of someone else’s unsterilised pet or a cat left behind when a family moved.
The kitten crisis no one talks about
As much as we love a good kitten kiss and a fluffy adoption update, there’s a reality behind the cuteness that keeps us up at night.
When you look at the ratio of feral cats we’ve trapped and sterilised vs the number of kittens we’ve had to remove from colonies and rehome, it’s honestly frightening. The kitten population continues to explode, far outpacing the good work we’re trying to do through TNR (Trap, Neuter, Return).
For every adult cat we manage to sterilise, there always seems to be a new litter waiting. One unsterilised female can produce dozens of kittens in her lifetime, and without intervention, those kittens grow up to repeat the cycle.
And while we’ll always have room in our hearts (and homes… and cars… and vet schedules) for the babies, we cannot adopt our way out of this crisis.
Sterilisation is the only real solution.
If you feed, foster, or even occasionally interact with stray cats in your area, please sterilise. If you don’t know how, we’ll help you. It’s what we do.
Looking ahead: big goals and bigger needs
We operate primarily in Randburg and surrounding areas, including Roodepoort, Muldersdrift, Strijdom Park, and Aeroton, but the truth is, if there’s a cat in need and we can get there, we’ll do our best to help.
One big item on our wish list? A Panel Van or VW Caddy. Right now, we can only fit 4-6 traps in our cars at a time, which limits our ability to trap larger colonies. A dedicated vehicle would be a game-changer.
Why we’re still hopeful
We’ve seen our feral network grow from a handful of feeders five years ago, to an explosion of dedicated NPOs and carers. Seeing the incredible work others are doing gives us hope. The more of us there are, the more manageable the feral cat population becomes.
But with this growth comes a new challenge, and one we can’t ignore.
Right now, anyone can buy a trap. Anyone can call themselves a rescuer. And while many start with the best intentions – rescuing kittens, helping strays without experience, support, or structure – things can quickly go sideways.
We’ve seen it happen: a well-meaning individual ends up unintentionally spreading deadly diseases like panleukopaenia, or gets overwhelmed by too many cats and too little support, edging dangerously close to hoarding territory.
This isn’t about gatekeeping – it’s about guidance. We believe there’s an urgent need for regulation in our field.
A governing body, or at the very least a collective code of best practices, could help steer rescuers in the right direction before things unravel. Because once things fall apart, it’s the cats who suffer first. The community gets upset, the cats get sick, and the rescue’s original mission is lost in chaos.
The SPCA, though crucial to animal welfare in South Africa, is already stretched so thin. They can’t be expected to carry the burden of proactive feral cat trapping too. That’s why grassroots organisations and individuals like us matter and why we must also be held to a standard that protects the animals we care so much about.
Still, despite the uphill climbs and hard truths, we remain hopeful.
We’ve built incredible relationships with vets who’ve become like family. They’ve seen us happy, heartbroken, frustrated and in trackpants more often than we’d like to admit.
We’re ever so grateful for our loyal supporters – our donation fairies, post-sharers, comment-section cheerleaders, and kind-hearted encouragers who come through when we need it most.
Every like, share, and drop-off of pilchards, tuna, or kitten formula counts. You’re the reason we keep going (even when we’re doing laps across town to pick up stinky, urine-marking feral males).
At the end of the day, we’re just three full-time working, ordinary women with full-time hearts for feral cats.
We trap, treat, feed, foster, advocate, and love, because every single cat deserves a shot at a better life.
We’re also proud to be a Woolworths MySchool MyVillage MyPlanet beneficiary. If you’re a cardholder, you can support Cat Family Foundation every time you shop, at no extra cost to you, just extra help for the cats. (Seriously, it’s the easiest way to do good with your groceries.)
Cat ladies with a side hustle
Our first toe-dip into market life happened in September 2020, when we rocked up with handmade cat scratch posts* and quirky recycled bottle glassware – part fundraiser, part community upliftment project.
We roped in locals to help us turn trash into treasures, proving that, with a little creativity, even wine bottles and carpet offcuts could help save cats.
Since then, we’ve become seasoned stallholders – regularly popping up at markets with all sorts of cat-themed goodies, from cute to quirky and everything in between.
Sure, a lot of our stock comes from budget-friendly online stores (great for fundraising), but every now and then one of our lovely supporters surprises us with hand-crocheted scarves and hats, locally made toys, or birthday gift bags that are too adorable to resist.
Think mugs, accessories, and things you didn’t know you needed but absolutely do (yes, we’re still talking about that “Purr More, Hiss Less” mug).
Every Rand we raise goes straight back to the paws – supporting sterilisations, vet care, and food for our colonies.
So, next time you spot us in a sea of stalls, come say hi, grab something purrfect, and help us help the cats!
* RC Ferals still make these cat scratch posts and you can order them from Kim. (https://www.facebook.com/RCFerals) or contact her on 072 941 0172.
Want to help?
If you’d like to join our mission, help us reach that van goal, or swipe for a cause, follow us on social media or get in touch – we’d love to hear from you! Email wecare@catfamilyfoundation.co.za or visit https://www.facebook.com/CatFamFoundation.
Happy 5th Birthday to us!
