LEXINGTON, Ky. – When feral cats are taken to animal shelters it can be difficult to find a home that is suitable for their needs. The Working Cat Project, based in Lexington, has found a positive solution by connecting these furry friends to property owners who are struggling with rodent problems in their barns, stables and warehouses.

Spearheading this effort is Peyton Skaggs, founder and executive director of The Working Cat Project.

“These cats provide chemical-free pest control and find their forever home in the process,” Skaggs said.

“Cats in our program come from local shelters or unsafe, outdoor living conditions,” she said. “These cats are either too feisty, fearful of people, or have litter box issues. Community or alley cats enter our program when their outdoor home becomes unsafe. The outcome for cats in these situations is usually grim. The Working Cat Project steps in to fill this gap and saves lives.”

The project started when Skaggs’ 14-month-old kitten, Jack, died unexpectedly. She was determined to channel her energy into a project to honor her kitten’s life. She decided to look for a way to provide a safe haven for at-risk cats. That’s when the Working Cat Project, an official 501(c)(3) organization, was born.

“We are essentially a liaison between the shelter and farms,” Skaggs said. “We’re contacted by the rural shelters and we coordinate with the farm placement the same day that we receive the cats. Sometimes when cats are in a shelter environment, their behavior is not what it would be on a farm. After a few short weeks the cats bloom at farms, get comfortable. This becomes their new family and the cats get comfortable. To my knowledge we are the only organization in the U.S. that strictly does barn cat placement. We have thousands of farms within a 50-mile radius.”

The Working Cat Project places cats in Fayette, Madison, Jessamine, Woodford, Scott, Bourbon and Clark counties in Kentucky. As of June 2024, Skaggs and her crew have placed 573 cats onto more than 200 farms in rural areas that don’t have a trap-neuter-return (TNR) program. They’ve placed them at some of the most prestigious farms in central Kentucky, including Gainesway, Calumet and Coolmore. 

The cats are placed into safe barn homes. The property owner is required to provide shelter, food and water. All cats are vaccinated and spayed/neutered prior to arriving at their new home.

There is a mandatory four-week kenneling of the cats at the new property to ensure they get used to their surroundings and their new caregiver. After the four weeks, the cats are released to become full-time pest control staff.

“Without this program cats get euthanized,” Skaggs said. “We stepped in to find these cats a permanent home. And when people reach out to us in need of additional assistance with medical bills we try to help out as much as we can to make sure the cats are taken care of.”

Ginger Dannemiller and her daughter, Caroline, own and operate TrueBlue Farm in Lexington. They reached out to The Working Cat Program and obtained two barn cats. Today they have 13 cats.

“We bought the farm in 2019 and we saw that there were rodents around that we didn’t want,” Caroline said. “Rats were literally eating through the sheet rock to get to our grain. It was a big issue. We tried using traps and those weren’t fun to deal with. We didn’t want to put chemicals down so we found out about The Working Cat Project and got our first two working cats. It took them a while to eradicate the rats in the barn, but they’ve been amazing hunters since day one.”

Ginger said, “One of the cats, Pumpkin, is an early rising ‘employee.’ She gets out first thing in the morning, eats her breakfast, then searches a bit in the barn and in the stalls. Pumpkin works sunrise to sunset, even if it’s super cold out.”

Laura Haag, sales manager at Endeavor Farm in Versailles, Ky., has found similar success using The Working Cat Project.

“We adopted six cats,” Haag said. “These cats have contributed by keeping the mice population down on our farm. Before the cats arrived, the mice got into our grain, made messes, and at times the horses wouldn’t eat the grain. Now, everyone who visits our farm knows the cats and wants to feed them when they come to visit.

“A lot of people think a feral cat is going to be mean and claw, but that’s not true. We have three cats who are friendly and love to interact and three others who are aren’t aggressive or mean, they’re just standoff-ish.”

Skaggs said, “You supply the shelter, food and water. The cats provide the rodent control.”

The suggested adoption fee is $50 for the cats. For more information visit www.workingcatprojectky.org/