What do you think when you hear the term ‘cat hoarder’? You might think that anyone who has more than a certain number of cats is a ‘hoarder’. But that’s not quite true – cat hoarding is a complex issue caused by mental illness.
A cat hoarder will have an extremely large number of cats, much more than a typical household. Sadly, they’re unable to provide adequate standards of care and attention, which causes the cats to suffer.
Signs of a cat hoarder
Cat hoarders have an intense emotional attachment to cats and live in houses that are overrun with cats and kittens. The outward signs will vary based on how long the hoarding situation has been going on, but you can expect to see:
- Overcrowded living spaces – you’ll see cats in every room of the house and on top of every piece of furniture.
- Excessive clutter – rooms will be untidy and cluttered. Household debris such as empty cat food tins and household rubbish will build up over time.
- Dirty and unhygienic – cat hoarders struggle to keep up with cleaning litter boxes. You’ll smell cat faeces and urine throughout the living spaces.
- Property damage – over time, large numbers of cats will scratch and destroy walls, furniture and carpets.
Most cat hoarders are in denial about what they’re doing. They believe they’re cat lovers looking out for the best interests of the cats in their care. They may not see the detrimental effect that hoarding has on the cats’ well-being or their own daily life.
A hoarder is also likely to be secretive about how many cats they have, and their condition. They may feel embarrassed or ashamed and are likely to be defensive or evade any questions when asked. Cat hoarders can be reclusive and want to keep people out of their homes. They like to maintain control but also want to prevent people from discovering the overcrowded and unsanitary conditions they and the cats live in.
Why do people become cat hoarders?
There is usually a combination of factors that contribute to cat hoarding behaviour. Cat hoarders strongly believe they’re doing it for the love of cats – helping and saving cats in need. When they take on the role of caregiver it gives them a strong sense of purpose.
Dr Mark Lawrie, former chief vet at RSPCA NSW says that most hoarders start out with good intentions but:
[It gets] to the point where they’re not even seeing them as animals anymore, but just an item that they’re collecting.
ABC News, “Animals become ‘things to collect’ as pet ownership descends into hoarding”, 30 March 2023.
For some people, hoarding behaviour is a coping mechanism after a traumatic event, such as illness or the loss of a loved one. Cats provide companionship, comfort and stability. People who are sad and lonely or have a history of trauma, form an attachment to cats because it makes them feel better. In extreme cases, that emotional bond leads to a desire to accumulate more cats.
In most cases, the root cause of cat hoarding is an underlying mental illness, such as obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), depression, anxiety, or a personality or attachment disorder.
A cat hoarder has a distorted perception – they think they are rescuing cats. Hoarders also struggle with decision-making and have difficulty letting go. That’s why it is so hard for a hoarder to give up any of their cats and rehome them.
How many cats is considered hoarding?
It’s difficult to put a specific number on when cat ownership becomes hoarding. Animal welfare organisations consider someone to be a cat hoarder if they have more cats than they can adequately care for. Caring for cats involves more than the provision of basic needs such as food and shelter. It also includes veterinary care, environmental enrichment, and socialisation for their overall well-being.
The consequences of cat hoarding
When a high number of cats live together and aren’t being properly cared for, the results can be horrific.
Spread of infectious diseases
Living in overcrowded and unsanitary conditions poses many health risks for cats. They are more likely to get respiratory infections, parasites, and other contagious illnesses such as:
- frequent flea infestations, ticks or ear mites
- intestinal worms
- feline herpesvirus or calicivirus which spread through coughing or sneezing
- other serious infections such as FeLV, FIV or FIP.
The hoarder may also be at risk of zoonotic diseases transmitted from animals to humans, such as ringworm or toxoplasmosis.
Lack of veterinary care
Cat hoarders often struggle to provide veterinary care due to finances or neglect. Overcrowded living conditions exacerbate health issues, and illnesses often go unnoticed and untreated. Without routine health checks and timely veterinary care, cats can become seriously ill.
If a cat hoarder isn’t taking their cats to the vet for basic care, they’re unlikely to be spayed or neutered either. So the hoarded population continues to grow with the birth of kittens.
Poor diet and malnutrition
With too many cats to feed, hoarders often struggle to provide enough food and water for each cat in their care. They may feed a cheap, low-quality or unbalanced diet that lacks the essential nutrients cats need.
In hoarding situations, competition and food aggression can also occur. Some cats may struggle to access food or not eat enough due to fear or aggression from other cats in the house.
Stress and behavioural issues
It’s not only the cats’ physical health that’s compromised at the hands of cat hoarders. Their mental health and social needs are often affected.
Like humans, cats are easily affected by stress, so the tension caused by living in large groups can be a real issue. Behavioural signs of a stressed cat include aggression, urine spraying, overgrooming or wanting to hide all the time. Stress can also weaken their immune systems making cats more susceptible to illness.
The more cats a hoarder has, the less human contact and interaction they get. This lack of socialisation can result in cats becoming fearful, skittish or withdrawn. In many hoarding situations, cats become semi-feral.
How to help a cat hoarder
The sad fact is that many animals rescued from hoarders have to be euthanised. Hoarded cats are likely to suffer from physical illness as well as social and behavioural problems, so it’s not always easy to rehome them.
A non-judgmental and empathetic approach is essential when helping a cat hoarder. It’s important to remember that cat hoarding usually results from underlying mental health issues.
You will need a multi-faceted approach to help cat hoarders and their cats:
- Provide information to help hoarders understand the impact on the cats’ well-being and quality of life.
- Offer practical assistance to improve living conditions for the cats.
- Involve local animal welfare organisations to provide guidance, veterinary care and help with rehoming.
- Encourage the hoarder to seek professional help to support their mental well-being.
- If the hoarded cats are in immediate danger or the hoarder is unwilling or unable to change, legal authorities can help protect the cats.
Not all individuals with multiple cats are hoarders, so don’t panic if you have more than the average number of cats. As long as you can provide the highest standards of care (including veterinary treatment) and your cats are happy and healthy, then you’ve simply got a larger-than-average feline family!
Have you known any cat hoarders? Or been involved with rescuing cats from hoarding situations? Share your experiences in the comments.
Note: photos of cats in this article are not from a hoarding situation.
I live with my girlfriend who I love dearly. She has 11 cats that have all been fixed. She used to have 13. Sickness took one and old age with the other. I love all these cats as she does! But these cats constantly crave for attention. One of them is the biggest lover but is so overweight that it can’t even clean itself. Putting this cat on a diet would be impossible because of the others needing to eat. How can I ever get her to let any of these cats go somewhere that they can get the individual attention they so need?
I remember growing up there was one in a very nice neighborhood near us. It was so sad. As a kid we’d ride our bikes and when we turned onto the street you could smell it from several houses away. All the windows were covered with shades or foil, the yard was overgrown, and it looked spooky. I remember feeling really sad for the lady who lived there. I was very young but I remember thinking she must be very lonely to need all of those cats. 🙁
That has always been my thoughts exactly, having 7 (used to be 8) pets, while a large number isn’t hoarding! All see the vet annually (or more often if needed), all have proper grooming and preventative/maintenance care (HW meds, flea/tick prevention).
Hoarding is a complex problem. Years ago I met a woman in the pet store who told me she had over 50 cats. She said she knew that was too many, but she had no one to help her with them. The local animal shelter told her she had to pay $50 per cat if she wanted to surrender them. She was really in a no win situation, because she didn’t have the money to surrender them. There was speculation that animal control was waiting for the problem to get big enough to make the news and then people would rush in with donations, etc. In the mean time, both the woman and the cats were overwhelmed.
Great post! I take hoarding seriously and when I reached 15 cats I started seeing a therapist. I know I can’t take care of anymore than that properly. One of mine came from a hoarding situation and half of those kitties had to be put down.
We just had #15 dropped off with us last night.
All of ours are well tended and see the vet.
They are all sweet and loving. We handle each one within their tolerances.
Two came from a hoarder in a flea-infested 2 bedroom apartment with a dozen dogs and as many cats & kittens as kittens and they have specific personality issues, but have over the years come out of their shells and even come to sit in our laps or snuggle while we watch TV.
We have 2 who are 17 and have heart murmurs.
Another who is 10 and recovering from urinary blockage.
Everyone else is happy, healthy, vaccinated, sterilized, and well socialized. They come looking for love and snuggles.
They all eat, sleep, rassle, play, and bathe together. Sometimes they fuss, but they stop when called down.
One is a 10 year old crosseyed siamese who doesn’t have good vision. She specifically doesn’t like boys, but that’s because she used to live with a Bengal who was unnusally aggressive. She specifically doesn’t like two of our males and they sometimes have very loud words. But no one is ever hurt.
We didn’t intend to have this many. We don’t go looking for them. We always say “no more.” And then they come to us.
I don’t think we could handle more. I hope we aren’t put in a position to have to choose whether to take one in or take it to the pound.
It is amazing how many cases of animal hoarding there are in my area. It is sad to see all of those animals pulled out of the home in the condition that they are in. Personally, I believe that the problem has to be solved by helping the humans involved to overcome their mental illnesses. Hoarders will just start hoarding again if they aren’t helped.
Stories about hoarding situations are always sad. One of the many reasons they break my heart is that the owners don’t know what kind of harm their putting their pets through. To them, they are doing the right thing and providing them with a home, and love. It’s hard to see someone go through something like that. Thanks for spreading the word!
We see hoarding situations on the news. Just recently nearly 100 dogs were rescued. It’s really sad to know these conditions happen.
At one point, my gramma thought Mom might become a cat hoarder as she had four cats, but it never happened. It is easier to hoard cats as they live in the house, dog hoarding is more difficult as they need to go out, etc. Hoarding of any kind is very sad and when animals are involved it is a real bad situation.
Great post! Thank you for sharing. Hopefully others will recognize the signs (some, in themselves) and a difference can be made. Such a sad and difficult situation.
When I lived on the farm a few years ago, we had some intact ferals. At first, I was sad because we had to give the kittens away. Later, I was sad because they could not find good homes, or could only find other farms when I thought they would make good house cats. Many of the area rescues were either full, charged the old owner upon surrender, or both.
One cool spring morning I had all 11 kittens (and one of the queens) sleeping on my lap at the same time. One fall, we fixed four of that spring’s kittens (which were all that we still had from those litters) — that was all the spaces that low-cost spay/neuter clinic had available on their next available day. One of those fixed cats is now my house cat, and she does not particularly want another cat to live here.
We had a litter box in the shed, until we got a bad bag of litter and the cats stopped using it (a couple of months later, we had to move across the road and they had to move out of the shed). They went through about a 25 pound bag of kitty litter in a week.
My cat Sadie came from a hoarder. She was super thin and begging for love when I rescued her at 6 months old. It’s such a sad, sad situation.
@DogMomDays
I’ve never known any cat hoarders personally, but I used to watch “Confessions: Animal Hoarding” on Animal Planet. It is so sad for everyone involved. Most of the time, hoarders have OCD and/or have been through some serious trauma. They do love their cats, but they get addicted to rescuing cats and end up taking too many in. Oftentimes hoarders are people who are really hurting, and I think they should be show compassion from their friends and families.
Thank you for the informative post!
Wow I didn’t realize that high of a percentage of cats rescued from hoarding situations had to be euthanized. I’ve seen the deplorable conditions but usually when I’m reading about it or seeing it on the news it stops at “and they were rescued..” I never realized what happens after the animals are assessed. It’s a very sad situation indeed for everyone involved – and from what I’ve read the hoarders really do feel like they’re helping out by giving them a home. Just sad that it gets to these extremes.
Great post! Two of us, Little Bit and Stara, were rescued from an animal-hoarding situation. The people who originally had them were neighbors two houses down from Mommy and Daddy when we lived in Portland. The people originally had Starla and Boo-Boo Kitty when they moved in. They immediately abandoned Starla, who ended up in our basement/laundry room and developed severe anxiety because she is not suited for feral living with a clowder outside. The feral cats chased her. Boo-Boo Kitty got pregnant and had a litter of three. At the same time, the people got a puppy. The puppy ate one of the kittens. Another of the kittens, Smokey, was abandoned as she grew up and also ended up in our basement/laundry room. Smokey was eventually adopted to Mommy Erin. The third kitten, Little Bit, they kept. Fast forward a year. Boo-Boo Kitty got pregnant again with a litter of four, Little Bit had a litter of four, and the dog had a litter of 10 puppies! The people got evicted from their house because of the number of animals. They are barred from having animals again, ever, in the City of Portland. One family took in the dogs. We took in two of Boo-Boo Kitty’s litter, plus Little Bit and her four boys. We found homes for all the kittens and kept Little Bit. The people dumped Boo-Boo Kitty by a shelter that wouldn’t take her. Very sad situation!!!
That was a very interesting post to me, I’ve never heard (and thought of) cat hoarders before! I’m a bit surprised now, because it’s obvious that this happens.
If I wasn’t so jealous, I’m sure the peeps would be hoarders cos they hoard water and paper towels. MOL! I’m just kidding. Mitzi, the cat I was adopted with, was one of 26 cats whose human had a stroke.
I found the Austrailian study you cited very insightful. I’m woefully behind in my research for the hoarding series I was supposed to write last year. Yikes, I need an assistant.
We hate hearing stories about any animal hoarding situation. The consequences are so sad.
It’s a terrible situation, when this happens. Every now and again our local/regional news will report on a hoarding situation, definitely not limited to cats, sometimes it’s a mix of non-humans in the house. It makes me feel physically ill, as I’m sure it does everyone else.