Tuesday is World Spay Day, a global initiative to curb pet overpopulation.
“It’s an international day that recognized the need for spaying and neutering for worldwide population control,” says Linda Felix, Spay Day HRM Society president.
Spay Day HRM Society partnered with Tartan Tails Veterinary Hospital to provide this service to low-income families.
“Around 60 per cent of the population actually owns one or more pets so it just goes to show how many people out there that we can help care for,” says Michelle Doane, Tartan Tails Veterinary Hospital lead RVT.
Tartan Tails Veterinary Hospital’s operating room was busy Tuesday and the team felt grateful to be helping the community.
“This job is amazing every day but especially today where we can help so many families spay and neuter their pets. I know it feels good for me and I know my team here loves doing it every year, you kinda go home feeling like you are doing something for your community,” says Doane.
They are one of seven hospitals and clinics that have partnered with the society, providing spay and neutering services across the Maritimes.
“We are doing it at three different hospitals and our total number is 63 and here we are doing about 30 today,” says Doane,
The goal is to reduce pet overpopulation, prevent unwanted litters and improve animal welfare.
“It’s super important to spay and neuter your animals to help control the pet population, it helps with their health, and just makes it so we don’t have too many little critters running around that we can’t care for,” says Doane.
“The need is great in the community. We have applications that come in on an ongoing basis. We can tell by the various apartment buildings and neighbourhoods there is a higher ratio of cats in the poorer neighbourhoods,” says Felix.
For 14 years, the society has worked with low-income families to make these services more accessible. They have been involved in World Spay Day itself for 10 years.
“We’re over 6,800 cats spayed and neutered since we started 14 years ago,” says Felix.
Felix says she starts going through the applications after Christmas.
“We take applications and organize with various clinics and cat owners of low income to make this day come together,” says Felix.
Due to high demand, they have spread out their services across several days this year.
“Since we started in January of 2025, so far we have done 159 cats for low-income families. Today is 70 of that 159,” says Felix.
The society aims to reduce barriers to these services for low-income families.
“Families that are low income or have various disabilities, physical, mental, there’s a lot of challenges to having their cat spayed and neutered. Getting to and from the clinic is just one of them. You have literacy issues if there is paperwork to fill in. They just can’t get the cat there, they don’t have a cat carrier, you know, mobility, whatever, there is always a big list of impediments to having their cat fixed so we overcome all the barriers,” says Felix.
Felix and her team cover the whole process from start to finish.
“This includes the drive to the clinic, the spay or neuter at the vet clinic, we also cover fleas and worms if they need it, we make sure the cat gets spayed no matter what,” says Felix.
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