SYDNEY, N.S. — Lucky might not have been fortunate to have a long life, but the cat’s memory lives on in an expanding network of pet food cupboards around the Cape Breton Regional Municipality.
“To lose part of your family, it’s heartbreaking,” said Lucky’s bereaved owner Charmaine Slaney of North Sydney.
“I don’t want anyone else to choose between themselves and their animal.”
The community effort began about six months ago to honour Lucky, who died in September 2023 of a previously undiagnosed heart ailment. He was just a few years old.
“We wanted a way to keep Lucky’s memory alive,” Slaney said.
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So they started out with community pet food pantries in Sydney Mines and North Sydney. Now they’re in locations that include Sydney, New Waterford, Glace Bay and Florence with the help of volunteers to keep them stocked and donations from people and pet food stores.
“It’s grown big time,” said Slaney, who started a Facebook page, Pet Community Cupboard.
“And it never lets us forget him.”
‘I am overjoyed'
The demand, she said, is huge.
“We have been refilling them at least twice a day,” she said.
“I was overwhelmed with the amount of support that came with the cupboards, the volunteers that take care of them. It meant a lot to me. It does take a lot of their time between the sorting and the filling and everything. I am overjoyed.”
Slaney asks people to contact them if the cupboards are empty, so pets don’t go without. They also ask that each person in need leave something for others and not empty the cupboard.
Slaney has a dog and two cats and buys large bags of food and packages smaller ones for the cupboards. There are also at times, toys, leashes and pet clothing.
She hopes the service helps people from having to give up pets in a time of high costs for fuel, groceries and housing.
That’s because of how much her family was attached to Lucky, who was just a few years old when he died.
“I don’t want anyone else to choose between themselves and their animal.” — Charmaine Slaney
The life of Lucky
“Lucky was very playful. He was comical. He loved to get into mischief,” she said.
She had agreed to take him from someone who had gotten him as a kitten and fed him with a syringe as he was in poor health.
“He loved to get up and cuddle with you, sleep on your chest. He loved to play with his toys,” Slaney said.
She also said he was affectionate.
“I wondered sometimes if he even knew he was a cat,” Slaney said.
The death of Lucky Poo hit them hard.
“He became everything to us….I don’t think I cried so hard in my life,” she said. “My husband even cried.”
In the wake of his death, she thought about what to do to remember him.
“How about I do a pet cupboard and in his honour?” she said of how the idea came about.
Slaney, with the help of her daughter, Olivea builds cupboards and waterproofs them with shingles.
Helping out
Naomi Pembroke Boyd of Sydney operates a pantry on Bentinck Street.
“I got involved when I saw a post online asking for volunteers for the cupboard. I messaged Char and offered to have one of the pantries be placed outside my house,” said Pembroke Boyd of Barktastic Treats.
“Another community member made two cupboards for me; both are outside my home. One for cats and one for dogs.
“On average, I have about 50 visits per week to the cupboards I run plus people message me to ask for food and I will do up a care package tailored to their needs which they then pick up from my home.”
“She is a lifesaver,” Slaney said.
Amber Dowell, Slaney’s daughter, is planning to set one up in Scotchtown.
“I hope it helps the people that need it,” she said.
“I hope that nobody is greedy with it and leaves stuff for other people.”
Slaney is also looking for a volunteer to put a pet cupboard in Howie Centre.
New Waterford dog groomer Sonya Brenna has a pantry outside her Tails of the Town shop on Vieniot Avenue. She said students built it in the shape of a Snoopy doghouse.
“I love it — people are so supportive, it’s unreal,” she said.
“There’s demand, definitely.”
She said she sees cars pulling up to put food in as well as people needing help.
“Everything is so expensive right now,” Brenna said.
