Animal rescue volunteer in Dargaville needs shelter for abandoned animals

Wendy Cocurullo needs financial help to build a proper shelter for stray and abandoned animals in Dargaville. Photo / Supplied

An animal rescue volunteer in Northland has made an impassioned plea for help, particularly from the business community, to shelter stray and abandoned animals.

Wendy Cocurullo has been running Wendy's T L C Rescue in Dargaville from her dining room for five years but needs a proper shelter outside her Logan St home to house mostly wild, stray cats and kittens.

She has written to local businesses to help fund a kitset shelter with an attached outside area through donations or products that could be raffled off.

"With this bigger facility, more can be saved, vet checked, fixed, and rehomed. We need your help as the problem is bigger than what we can accommodate," she wrote.

Stray and abandoned animals, she said, were a major problem in Dargaville and surrounding areas and she has urged everyone to support the venture.

"Local vet care is working closely with us to provide the best they can for them, but we now find we need your help. This affects us all as a community."

Cocurullo has eight kittens in cages at the moment and two dogs of her own.

"The problem has gotten worse lately and it comes down to people not desexing them.
The idea is to get them out of the house because I can only keep so many inside."

So far, she has received a few small donations but is hopeful more people and businesses will come on board.

Cocurullo receives calls regularly about cats and kittens dumped on farms, towns, and other places and she works closely with SPCA and local vets to care and rehome them.

Those wishing to donate money can deposit it into Wendy T L C Rescue account 38-9005-0449385-00 or donated items can be picked up by Cocurullo or Caz Blundell.