Data Center Cat Rescue--Barn Cats for Adoption

35 cats rescued due to data center construction.

When Loudoun Community Cat Coalition received calls from residents and employees that cats were being displaced by data center construction in Aldie, Virginia, they came to the rescue. Over the course of several months the need became urgent as the construction schedule set a November, 2025 deadline.

Tom Bove, Executive Director, tells this compelling story on Pet Info Café Episode 50. Kittens were socialized and adopted, the domesticated cats were also adopted. Some of the cats were house cats who were abandoned by people who moved or who just didn't want them anymore. Approximately 15 outdoor cats are ideal candidates to become barn cats, to provide rodent control in a barn or a garden center or even a winery or brewery. In the meantime, one of the rescuers converted a two-car garage into a cat haven. Can your barn be their next safe home?

You can submit an application to adopt the cats at https://www.loudouncommunitycats.org/adoptions Just put "barn cats" on the form and our barn cat program lead will contact you. There is no fee to adopt any of these cats, and LC3 can provide everything you need to get the cats set up and acclimated to your barn, brewery, winery, or garden center. You just provide them with food, water, and shelter so they can live and "work" on rodent control.

Tom Bove, Loudoun Community Cat Coalition: They are all "barn cats" at this point. We already adopted out any socialized cats we trapped from the site.

We TNR'd cats at a neighborhood in Aldie in 2017 and again in 2018, as well as at a nearby industrial site. Volunteers in the neighborhood fed the cats and monitored for kittens since then. We hadn't heard from them for more than 6 years when we refeived a call from a volunteer feeder who was moving away along with half the neighborhood because their homes and the forest behind them were purchased for demolition and construction of data centers. She didn't know if anyone would continue feeding the cats, or if any of the forest would be left standing.

We contacted another volunteer who had been feeding the cats, and she met with the construction team to inform them of the colony living there, and to inquire about the project. They were very helpful and provided a rough schedule for demo and construction, and a map of the affected area, which was all of it! The homes and the forest were to be completely razed, clear-cut and stripped. We had about 6 months to trap and relocate all of the cats, estimated to be about 15-20 cats. 

As is typical, once we started trapping, we found that there were more than 40 cats in the colony, and about a dozen hadn't been spayed or neutered. We began TNR-ing the cats to stop any further breeding, and as we trapped ear-tipped cats we held them until we could place them in "barn homes. We assessed every cat to determine socialization, and adopted them out as indoor pets if they were social.

About 6 weeks into the project the workers told us that the schedule was accelerated and we had 3 weeks before we had to vacate the property for demolition. We trapped non-stop and put out an emergency request for barn homes, and for anyone who had a building we could use as a temporary enclosure to house 3 or more cats until we could find homes for them. Finally with about 1 week left before we could no longer access the property our TNR program lead converted her 2-car garage into a makeshift cat sanctuary with shelters and cat trees, and we moved more than 2 dozen cats into the space.

We are still trying to find outdoor homes for 15 of the cats.

You can submit an application to adopt the cats at https://www.loudouncommunitycats.org/adoptions

Just put "barn cats" on the form and our barn cat program lead will contact you. There is no fee to adopt any of these cats, and we can provide everything you need to get the cats set up and acclimated to your home. You just provide them with food, water, and shelter so they can live and "work" on rodent control.