Herding Cats in Gwangju with Abby Milone
Interview by Lisa Casaus
On any given day, if you ask Abby Milone what she’s up to, you’re likely to get an answer like this: A good day is running home every three hours to bottle-feed a pair of two-week-old orphaned kittens. A bad day is rushing to the ER at midnight with a kitten who was suddenly paralyzed. But it’s all in a day’s work for this dedicated cat foster-mom, who has fostered or adopted out a total of 59 kittens in the year 2023 alone! Learning facts like these, I couldn’t resist doing an interview:
Lisa: Over 50 kittens in one year! Do you have a total figure since you started your cat foster project in Gwangju?
Abby: I’m currently fostering Kitten #82. Kitten fostering has kind of turned into my specialty, but I try to do other stuff, too, like connecting people with other cats or dogs that need homes.
Lisa: When and how did you get started with fostering?
Abby: In September of 2021, I noticed these older Korean ladies throwing buckets of water across the street onto a stray cat in the bushes. The cat finally ran away, but I noticed some movement in the bushes. There were three teeny-tiny kittens huddled there, soaking wet. Their umbilical cords were still attached! I didn’t know anything about what to do in that situation, but Google told me to wait a couple hours to see if the mom would come back. She didn’t, so I got a friend to call Gwangju City Shelter. They said that it would be kinder to leave them outside and hope the mom would come back because the shelter was already overwhelmed. They would die without being fed every 2–3 hours. I called a friend who used to be a vet tech in the US. She rushed around Gwangju trying to find kitten formula, and I scooped up the kittens, put them in a cardboard box with heated rice in a sock to keep them warm, and started watching every single Kitten Lady YouTube video.
Lisa: What happened next? You seem to always have one foster or another around.
Abby: A couple weeks later, someone else picked up a similarly aged kitten, and I figured that I could add in one more. The next spring, another person posted about a kitten they found under a car that her husband absolutely refused to allow in the house. My coworker scooped up a kitten from the middle of the road a few weeks later, and I already had the supplies to help. Then another person found a sick kitten… and it just kept spiraling.
Lisa: How many cats and kittens do you typically foster in a month?
Abby: There aren’t many kittens in January–March, but during the other months, I’ve had anywhere from 1 to 15 kittens at all times. I only had 15 once, for like one or two days. That was too much, haha.
Lisa: It definitely sounds like a lot! What has motivated you to continue your fostering work until now?
Abby: When I moved to my current home about three years ago, I noticed how many stray cats were in the area. I had learned about the importance of TNR (trap–neuter–release) and decided I wanted to do it in my area since I think that it is the single most important thing you can do to help street cats.
Lisa: You gave a GIC Talk about TNR in November 2023. What would you like people to know about it?
Abby: Street cats occupy a unique space in the community. Some people view them as pests; others view them as poor abandoned animals. Unfortunately, there just aren’t enough homes for all of the cats in Korea and, quite frankly, a lot of street cats are feral and have no interest in interacting with humans. In response, all municipalities in Korea, including Gwangju, run TNR programs, where citizens and program organizers can trap street cats, spay or neuter them for free, and then release them back into the community where they will continue to be cared for by local “cat moms.” In Gwangju, the program is run by an organization called the Gwangju Cat Mom Welfare Association. They operate a Naver Cafe where you can apply to borrow traps and make an appointment for the person in charge of your district (gu) to pick up the cats you caught and bring them to a participating vet for surgery. Since one female cat can produce more than 100 kittens in her lifetime (and males can father a nearly infinite number), spaying and neutering ensures that the street cat population doesn’t increase, which would result in a worse quality of life for the cats due to competition for territory and the spread of disease. It also lessens the behaviors that humans find bothersome, such as yowling to find a mate, spraying, and fighting. So whether you love street cats or hate street cats, TNR is a win for everyone.
Lisa: What is your favorite part of the fostering process?
Abby: Adoption day! One thing that people always say is “Oh, I could never foster kittens because I’d get too attached and would want to keep them all.” Foster “parents” love cats just as much as you, but they have prepped themselves with a different definition of success. The mantra of successful foster parents is “Goodbye is the goal.” I’ve had several kittens die from diseases. That’s sad. I’ve seen really sick or injured stray cats on the street. That’s sad. I’ve seen lists of dozens of animals slated for euthanasia at city shelters because no one wants them and the shelter doesn’t have the resources to help them all. That’s sad. Sending the kitten to a happy home is the very definition of success in fostering. I always tell adopters that I would love to see pictures occasionally, and I would say I get updates from someone who adopted about once a week. I know they’re safe, happy, and healthy. They’re alive directly because of something I did.
The Interviewee
Abby Milone has been working in Gwangju for almost eight years. When she’s not caring for cats, she’s checking social media for adopters or playing trivia at Nirvana. She plans to continue working with cats and other animals wherever life takes her next. Instagram: @abbys_tabbies || Facebook: Abby’s Tabbies
The Interviewer Lisa Casaus, currently traveling, taught and volunteered in Gwangju for seven years before hearing about TNR. She likes cats but has an allergy.