A retired farmer’s sister says she was outraged when a Crowland resident claimed cats living in one of her brother’s barns would die if they were not rescued.
The Free Press joined Phil Newhouse of PJ Cat Rescue to investigate earlier this month.
Lucy Milbank had appealed to us to find help because she said some of the older cats were prowling the estate where her mother lives, frightening the local cats.
She said: “They are all hungry and look so ill. It’s a sad sight to see. The winter is coming and if something doesn’t get done, they will die.”
The barn at Cloot Drove Farm is owned by retired farmer John Smith. Thirteen cats and kittens were found there and Mr Newhouse estimated the “nest” probably housed a colony of 60 cats.
Mr Smith’s sister, Myrtle, of Kemp Street, said: “Three generations have farmed that land.
“We’ve never harmed an animal in our lives.
“There have always been cats down there - when we farmed the land there were about five.
“We never had any trouble before the estate came. Some of the cats at the barn came from there.
“It may not look much but to them its five-star accommodation. Would you leave if you had somewhere where you were fed every day?
“The RSPCA has visited and offered to take some cats if there got too many. We were planning to call at the end of the summer. But PJ Cat Rescue are welcome to take the lot.
“Saying they are not fed is a slap in the teeth for the people who go down there every day and feed them.
”It would really have hurt them to read the cats would die.”