Hearts have collectively broken over the kindness of a woman giving a cat toy to a stray “in case she never had one before.”
TikTok user @cutiepatootieecats has five cats of their own, listing their names as Spooky, Storm, Sage, Chucky and Coconut, and while they’re unable to bring in another cat to the family, they take the time to look after strays in the only way they can.
The user regularly shares clips of their own pet cats, as well as the strays she feeds in her area. And one particular video has gone viral, as users were left in tears at how a cat reacted to being given her first toy.
In a clip shared on May 27, the user shows off a shiny, feathery toy, before throwing it to a smoky gray cat outside, writing: “Giving one of the stray cats I feed a toy just in case she never had one before.”
The cat’s reaction was instant: she leaped onto the toy, sniffed it and began rubbing her scent on it, nuzzling it with her head, regularly looking up at the camera to see if her feeder was still watching.
Before too long, though, the stray returned to the step to ask for more food, and @cutiepatootieecats naturally obliged, with the video ending on the cat appreciatively nibbling on some dry food.
The act of kindness to a stray proved hugely popular, racking up over 420,000 views and 63,000 likes since being shared.
TikTok users were left in pieces by the sweet video, with one writing: “It makes me so sad to know there’s millions of cats that will never receive the love I show to my own cats.”
And another admitted: “Oh great now I’m crying at 8 a.m. thinking abt how the kitties that have never had toys (sic).”
“She started marking your house with her scent,” another wrote alongside a series of crying emojis, with one begging: “Please find her a home.” The user confirmed she was “trying to find her a home,” but said that, tragically, all her local rescues in Philadelphia are at maximum capacity.
@cutiepatootieecats Shes a cutie🥹 #straycat #foryoupage #cats
Across the United States, an estimated 3.4 million cats enter shelters each year, according to the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA).
Some of these stories have happy endings, with around 2.1 million cats going on to find new homes, and 100,000 stray shelter cats being reunited with their owners.
But, the ASPCA writes, around 920,000 shelter animals, including 530,000 cats, are euthanized in shelters each year.
There has been a major reduction in this number since 2011, where 7.2 million shelter animals were euthanized, with the decline partially explained by the rise in the number of animals being adopted or returned to their owners.