Domestic Cat Rescue - More Than a Cat Rescue

Volume 2 Issue 1
April 1, 2008
Author: Cheryl Hentz

Twenty years ago Jane Pagel was working in Chicago, managing a one-hour photo lab, having been in photography all her life. It was not her passion, however. Having a deep love for animals and wanting to work with them in some way, she decided to go to night school for dog grooming. After graduation she worked at a couple of different places in Chicago, but in 1993 decided to make the move to Wisconsin, settling on Greenville, just outside of Appleton. It was there that she opened her Little Squirt Grooming facility.

Soon after starting the business, she found a couple of stray cats, including some that were pregnant. As she found strays she tried finding suitable homes for them - something that blossomed into Domestic Cat Rescue (DCR). Once word of her efforts got around, other people began calling her with strays they had found or with information on a pet they knew of that was being surrendered and needed to be placed in a different home. Before long she was taking in puppies and dogs, as well as cats and kittens. Being the town's Assistant Constable in 1999 and Constable from 2001 to 2005, also increased the number of animals she was taking in. It is the constable who gets the calls about stray animals and she helped get many strays off the street and into a safe harbor.

"During that time I brought all of the animals that were at large into my rescue and paid out of my own pocket for them to be spayed or neutered and receive other health care. And I found them all homes. That was literally hundreds and hundreds of animals," Jane says, adding that today, besides cats and dogs, she has birds, rats, and even a few Pygmy goats and some chickens.

"I have a lot more than just cats these days. I didn't change the name, but it's just kind of an all-inclusive pet rescue. I do not, however, rescue ferrets, reptiles, or horses. I'm not real comfortable with ferrets and I don't know that much about reptiles," Jane says. "But I do try and help people with most pets."

And help she does! In her first year, Jane estimates she successfully rescued and placed four or five cats into new homes. Fifteen years later, she estimates there are about 500-plus animals in rescue...