The State of Pet Adoption Report 2023-2024 - Cat Adoption Insights

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Stats via PetRescue.com.au from 1st July 2023 to 30th June 2024.

Overall observations and trends

38,226 cats were adopted via the PetRescue platform during the 2023-24 financial year. There were 300 fewer listings and 1,000 fewer cat adoptions compared to the 2022-2023 financial year.

Both cat listings and cat adoptions on the PetRescue platform continue to trend up over time, despite a slight decrease in the yearly totals compared to the previous financial year.

The 2023-24 summer period saw a notable shift from normal seasonal trends of three peaks over the season. This change is likely caused by disruptions to cat sheltering and management due to a nationwide shortage of feline vaccines that occurred between late 2023 and early 2024. As expected, due to the time it takes for kittens specifically to be prepared for adoption, the impact of the vaccination shortage was most notable in the first half of 2024.

Typically, during the winter period, the adoption rate for cats on PetRescue nears 100%; most cats that are listed for adoption find homes, noted by a convergence of the two lines on the graph above. However, in May and June 2024, the number of cat listings reached an all-time high, while adoptions decreased over this period. It is unclear why this has occurred and if this was simply a correction in adoption numbers following the disruptions over the summer. 

Currently, Victoria and NSW are the only states with a substantial and active Council member presence on PetRescue. While Council members also come from other states, only those in Victoria and NSW are actively rehoming cats.

In all states and territories except Victoria and New South Wales, Local Councils and Vets adopted out low numbers of pets. In other states, shelters adopted out 54% of cats and rescues adopted out slightly under 46% of cats. In Victoria, councils directly adopted out approximately 15% of cats while shelters and rescue organisations each adopted out slightly over 40% of cats.

NSW was the only state in which shelters were under-represented in cat adoptions, being responsible for 24% of NSW cat adoptions. NSW rescues were responsible for the majority of cat adoptions in the state, at approximately 58%, with councils facilitating 13% of adoptions and Vet Clinics finding 339 cats new homes in the 2023-24 financial year.

When broken down state by state, it is clear that local conditions are impacting cat adoptions, creating significantly different outcomes for cats.

State-specific trends for the four states that list the most cats followed the same patterns as the previous financial year, with Victorian cat adoptions slightly increasing overall, Queensland continuing to see a reduction in cats listed for adoption, and NSW and Western Australian cat adoption numbers remaining steady. In all states, cat adoption numbers are driven largely by kittens and adolescents (light and dark green lines on the graphs above), showing the scale of impact that the uncontrolled breeding of cats, particularly during the warmer months, has on the sector. 

While NSW and Victoria show some evidence of the vaccine disruption during the summer cat breeding season, the overall trends observed are similar to previous years and reflect ongoing differences in state-based cat management and local conditions. Victoria appears to have entered a ‘new normal’ in pet listings and adoptions following the introduction of mandatory outcome reporting for sheltered animals in 2022, in which the summer height of cat listings and adoptions peaks at over 5,000 cats per quarter. 

The downward trend in kitten listings observed in Queensland coincides with targeted desexing programs being rolled out in multiple areas within the state. The first and largest of these is the Ipswich Community Cat Program, a collaborative effort between the Australian Pet Welfare Foundation and Animal Welfare League Queensland. Building on the positive results of this program, several other stakeholders in Queensland have also focused on desexing and humane urban stray cat management, and it is likely that these reductions are evidence of the combined impact of these programs.

Of the four states with the most cat adoptions, Victoria again had the lowest average and median time to adoption and the highest number of adoptions. This is likely because Victorian members adopted out approximately double the number of kittens, compared to members in NSW and QLD in 2023 and the first half of 2024, and kittens are adopted into homes faster than older cats. 

Notably, despite Victorian members adopting out approximately as many kittens as both NSW and QLD members combined, the average age of cats listed on PetRescue in Victoria is approximately 2.4 months older than the other states. This is only possible as Victorian members are also placing significantly more older cats than the other two states, indicating that Victorian members are likely achieving more positive outcomes for a broader range of cats than the other states.

Both ACT (^15%) and Tasmania (^82%) experienced an increase in the average time to first enquiry; however, they both experienced a concurrent and significant decrease in time to adoption, indicating a strong adoption demand for cats in these areas. 

Notably, NSW experienced a 58% increase in the average time to adoption for cats in the 23-24 financial year, with a concurrent decrease in median time to adoption. This indicates a significant drop in adoption demand for cats that are less popular with adopters within NSW.

Adoption restrictions impact cats and dogs differently due to differing societal expectations for different species of pets. While restrictions on placement with children under five were not particularly impactful for dogs, restrictions on placement with children of any age were significantly impactful for cats. Approximately 50% more cats in the restricted groups took longer than 60 days to find a home compared to non-restricted groups (about 20% to about 30%), and average days to first enquiry were approximately 100 days more for cats with restrictions on placement with children. 

Restrictions for placement with other pets also negatively impacted cats more than dogs, being almost as impactful as child-related restrictions. There is likely an interaction between the age of cats listed and the impact of restrictions on adoption metrics, as kittens are generally placed without restrictions, and adult cats are (on average) more likely to require specific placement due to their individual needs.

It is important for rehoming organisations not to place arbitrary restrictions on cat placements without a specific need for that individual cat, due to the significant negative impact this has on their pathway into a new home.

Similarly to dogs, kittens and younger cats are adopted faster than adult cats, and placement restrictions are more impactful on older cats compared to kittens. All adolescent and adult cat cohorts experienced increases in average time to adoption in the 2023-24 financial year; however, these increases were the greatest for adult cats and adolescents unable to be placed with small children. Adult cats unable to be adopted into homes with children under five years of age took approximately four times as long as kittens with no restrictions and almost three times longer than kittens with similar restrictions to be adopted. 

External and environmental factors

The most notable external factor to impact cat adoptions during the 2023-24 financial year was the nationwide shortage of cat vaccinations. This shortage lasted from the second half of 2023 into the second quarter of 2024, and prompted councils and shelters to limit or completely stop intake of cats while vaccines were unavailable. 

Following the temporary suspension of cat intake into shelters and council facilities, when intake resumed, PetRescue saw the highest number of cats listed on the platform in one month ever, with 4,201 cats listed in May 2024. 

Legislation governing the management of domestic cats in our communities varies more dramatically between states than that for dogs. New South Wales and South Australia are undergoing changes to domestic cat management, breeding, and sheltering legislation and regulations. As was the case in Victoria when mandatory reporting of outcomes by councils and shelters was introduced, it is expected that these will have an impact on pet adoptions over time, and we will continue to monitor the impacts of these changes on cat adoption numbers.

Following the significant change in Victorian cat adoption patterns coinciding with the introduction of mandatory reporting of outcomes for sheltered pets, we will continue to monitor the impact of regulatory changes in Victoria, including the Victorian Cat Management Strategy, which was released in early 2025. 

Despite concerns raised internationally over the impact of H5N1 avian influenza on cats, and potential for disease outbreaks in shelter cat populations and management of urban stray cats, Australia has yet to see any confirmed infections with H5N1 in any species in the country, and there have been no outbreaks of the disease in animal shelters in the United States, despite cat to cat transmission being possible. 

Highest risk cohorts identified

Despite kittens being the largest cohort of cats available on PetRescue, making up 50.5% of listings, on average, they receive their first enquiry almost 100 days sooner than adolescent cats and approximately 150 days sooner than adult cats. 1 in 5 adult or adolescent cats listed on PetRescue take longer than 60 days to find their new home, while only 1 in 9 kittens take this long. In the 2023-24 financial year, 2,908 adult cats took longer than 2 months to find a home.

The size categorisation for cats on PetRescue reflects information recorded about cats in care by PetRescue member organisations who use API links between the platform and their own software. Approximately two-thirds of cats listed on the platform are of unknown size, and their profiles are created manually. This cohort of cats takes 3.5-7.4 times as long to receive their first adoption enquiry, on average, compared to cats with a size listed in their profile. 

Cats listed as small have a median adoption time of just three days, and only one in 20 small cats take longer than 60 days to find their homes. The 610 cats listed online and described as large had the shortest time to first enquiry, but the longest median days to adoption of cats of known size; however, they were still adopted more than twice as fast compared to cats with no size listed. 

Given the interaction between organisation type, size, adoption policy and size categorisation of cats, it is likely that the listed size of the cat is less impactful than the type of organisation and adoption policy of the member group that lists them (e.g. APIs are almost all from shelters and large rescue orgs, whereas manual entry is more common for smaller rescues, vets and councils - and rescues have a longer time to adoption than shelters and councils, and are less likely to have flexible adoption approaches).

While member organisations anecdotally report that ‘fluffy cats’ are more popular with adopters and therefore move into homes more quickly, overall, coat length did not have a significant impact on the proportion of cats waiting longer than 60 days for adoption. Additionally, short-coated cats had a median time to adoption two-thirds of that of medium and long-haired cats. 

Given that the majority of kittens available on the platform are short-coated domestic short-haired kittens, the age of the cat is more impactful than the coat length in determining the speed of their time to adoption. 

Overall, cats over six months of age, regardless of their coat type, are the cohort of highest concern for cats. This is more notable for cats in the care of smaller organisations that do not use population management software.

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