PRINCE FREDERICK, Md. — Give Lululemon a few minutes and she will give you her best side. Then her other best side.
The 3-year-old gray tabby is waiting for a home at Calvert County’s Linda L. Kelley Animal Shelter, which featured her on Facebook this week. Staff describe her as a little shy when she first meets someone, but say she comes around quickly and soon wants attention, gentle petting and time with the people she likes best. She also, by the shelter’s account, is “quite the poser” and will happily show off for anyone holding a camera.
According to her adoption listing, Lululemon is a female domestic shorthair weighing 8 pounds, 7 ounces. As of Friday, Oct. 9, she had been at the shelter for five weeks.
Her timing could save an adopter some money. The shelter’s “Ghouls Just Wanna Have Homes” Halloween promotion runs through Saturday, Oct. 31, and everyone who adopts during the month draws a prize from a “spooky cauldron.” The draw can bring a fully waived adoption fee, a half-off adoption or a bag of candy. The county’s standard cat adoption fee is $40, so a half-off draw would bring Lululemon home for $20.
Whatever the fee, the shelter has said every adoption includes spay or neuter surgery, a microchip, age-appropriate vaccinations and a starter-care package to help the animal settle into its new home.
Lululemon has a lot of company. The shelter’s adoptable cats page listed 44 cats on Friday afternoon, alongside dogs, small animals and livestock. The Prince Frederick facility is an open-admission shelter, meaning it accepts every animal brought to it, and it has carried a heavy load since August, when a large animal control case sent the shelter looking for fosters, supplies and adopters. Because it is open admission, the shelter does not place animals on hold; each one goes to the first qualified adopter.
Meeting Lululemon
Anyone hoping to meet her outside her kennel first fills out the shelter’s cat adoption questionnaire, a pre-screening form that helps staff understand a would-be adopter’s household, lifestyle and expectations. The completed form can be emailed to animalshelter@calvertcountymd.gov or mailed to the shelter, and a staff member then reviews it and helps with the match. The county notes that submitting the form does not hold an animal or guarantee an adoption.
Adopters must be at least 18, show a valid U.S. government-issued photo ID, have their landlord’s or property owner’s approval, have no history of animal cruelty and sign an agreement acknowledging they can provide the training, medical care and attention a pet needs. Even during the October promotion, every adopter goes through the shelter’s standard screening.
The shelter, at 5055 Hallowing Point Road in Prince Frederick, is open for adoptions Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Mondays are reserved for owners reclaiming lost pets and for surrenders, and the shelter is closed Sundays. It also follows Calvert County Government’s holiday and weather closures. Questions can go to 410-535-7387.
Residents who can’t adopt right now still have ways to help. The shelter recruits volunteers for animal enrichment and care and foster homes for animals that need time to grow or heal, and it places under-socialized outdoor cats through its working cat program. Pet owners can also bring dogs and cats to the next drive-through rabies clinic, run with the Calvert County Health Department at the shelter from 5 to 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 21.
Lululemon and the rest of the shelter’s adoptable animals can be viewed at CalvertCountyAnimalShelter.com.
