Seven years ago, Kate Hayes, a veterinary nurse in Perth, Australia, adopted a 16-week-old Shih Tzu puppy named Moon.
Kate took him into Warwick Veterinary Hospital to meet her coworkers and discovered something unexpected: Moon loves cats. Someone brought in a litter of abandoned kittens and Moon spent all afternoon sitting next to their cage.
“He was obsessed with them,” Kate says. “He refused to leave.”
It wasn’t until she brought home Phoenix, a feral cat with an amputated leg, that she understood her dog’s true calling. Phoenix hissed and hid from Kate.
“Moon sat by her cage, pressing his face against it. He taught Phoenix that I’m worth trusting,” she says.
A three-legged American bulldog, Moe; Cheech the pug; and Panda, a Persian cat, round out the household pets, but it’s Moon who helps when Kate fosters kittens.“September to April is kitten season,” Kate says. “People bring abandoned kittens into our clinic, and we reunite them with their mothers or foster them until we find them families. Moon loves when I bring home kittens.”
Over the past six years, Moon has been a surrogate dad to 116 kittens. Upon their arrival, he licks and snuggles them. “If the kittens cry, Moon runs to them and then alerts me,” Kate says. “He knows he is loved and wants to pay it forward.”
