Column: You’re invited to a kitten shower, and here are gifts to consider
Columnist Chris Ramon, now president and CEO of Pasadena Humane, photographed in 2020 with a newborn kitten. Under his leadership, the organization’s foster program has expanded exponentially, ensuring every underage kitten who enters the shelter’s care has access to a loving foster home until they are ready for adoption.
In the fall of 2018, four 10-day-old kittens arrived at Pasadena Humane needing urgent care. I was only three days into my new role as the shelter’s first kitten nursery manager.
At the time, our foster program was growing, but it was still small. With just 40 foster homes and more than 2,000 “underage” kittens coming through our doors each year back then, we didn’t have the capacity to care for the youngest and most fragile, like these four.
Kitten season was winding down, and with space in the nursery, I asked if I could try to find their mother cat. I knew that with their mom, these kittens could thrive. Without her, we would not be able to care for them the way they needed.
I drove out to the area where the kittens were found and began knocking on doors. I lucked out just a couple of houses into my search. I found someone who knew exactly where the mother cat was.
I set a trap nearby, and less than an hour later, I was in my car with mama cat heading back to the shelter. She immediately gathered her kittens close, happily making biscuits while they climbed all over her.
The family was successfully reunited, but they still had a long way to go.
Mom and babies were suffering from an upper respiratory virus commonly spread among cats living on the streets. As mom fought off the virus, the babies needed supplemental feedings to stay strong enough to recover.
After a couple of weeks of dedicated care in our kitten nursery, the entire family made a full recovery. When the kittens reached 2 months of age, they were all adopted into great homes.
What could have been a sad ending for these kittens turned into a lifetime of happiness. And it sparked a big change in our organization.
Over the next year, we rapidly expanded our foster base and strengthened the veterinary support needed to care for every kitten that came into our shelter, regardless of age. As part of our intake process, we began educating people who found young kittens about the importance of keeping mom cats with their babies whenever possible and asked them to follow up if a mother had been found.
By the end of the following kitten season, my position as kitten nursery manager was no longer needed. We had put out the call to our community to foster, and they showed up.
Today, every underage kitten who comes into our care is quickly placed in a foster home. This approach has become so ingrained in the DNA of our organization that it’s hard to remember a time when it wasn’t this way.
The success of our foster program is a constant reminder of one of my core beliefs: People want to help, they just need to know how.
By asking our community to support us in saving the lives of underage kittens, we were honest about where we needed to improve. We essentially said, “We can do better, but we need your help to get there.” And with that transparency, people stepped up to help us save more lives.
Providing care and support to the 1,250 underage kittens who now come into our shelter each year truly takes a village. That’s why we’re hosting a kitten shower this year at the shelter to recruit new foster families and gather much-needed kitten care supplies.
This free, all-ages event will be packed with fun and learning, including educational presentations on neonatal kitten care, face painting and a vendor marketplace featuring cat toys, art, handmade goods and other treasures.
Don’t miss your chance to make a difference. Sign up today to foster kittens or attend our kitten shower to support our mission at pasadenahumane.org/foster
Chris Ramon is president and CEO of Pasadena Humane.
This blog post originally appeared as a column in the Pasadena Star-News on March 13, 2026.
