It’s not Halloween, nor is it National Black Cat Appreciation Day or even National Black Cat Day, but thanks to the success of Marvel’s latest blockbuster superhero film Black Panther, adoptions of oft-stygmatized, black-coated kitties appear to be on the rise.
The Daily Dot reports that one blogger on Tumblr recently posted about the surprisingly positive development on behalf of orphaned black felines everywhere.
“Unexpected benefit of Black Panther: my local pet shelters went from having something like 50-60 black cats between them to having NONE, because they’ve all been adopted out and named after the characters. ‘T’challa’ is the most popular, but there are a fair number of ‘Okoye’s’ and ‘Shuri’s’ as well … and one very confused elderly Humane Society volunteer wondering why someone would name such a sweet cat ‘Killmonger.’”
Marvel Studios; Melanie Stetson Freeman/The Christian Science Monitor/Getty Images
Although the evidence appears to be anecdotal thus far, ailurophiles seem to be taking the news seriously. Many of the comments to the original poster worried out loud about this potential new trend and what happens when the fad fades, to which the writer replied:
“I live in Durango, CO, and the shelters are SUPER small so they do their best to make sure people are really ready to take a pet home for good,” replied Gallusrostromegalus. “In order to adopt, you have to: Fill out a questionnaire about what facilities your home has and how you plan to take care of this animal. If the shelter sees something amiss … they won’t let you adopt that animal. Everyone is given a ‘Get Ready For Pet!’ Checklist of supplies, house-proofing, and medical procedures that will be needed for an animal before you can adopt. Seeing the full checklist and costs tends to weed out people who weren’t terribly serious about keeping an animal. All but one of the local shelters is no-kill, and the kill shelter doesn’t let people return animals to them, instead sending them off to one of the five no-kill places. According to Mary who runs the cattery, these cats are mostly being adopted to people who were looking to adopt a cat in general, then see the black kitties and go ‘LIKE BLACK PANTHER‘ and take them home, so for once, black cats are being adopted first. Also, cat adoptions are up in general, so that’s also great!”
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Traditionally considered unlucky, black cats are always in need of some good PR — and, preferably, loving forever homes. Visit Petfinder now to find your petite panther.
Now, let’s hope those awesome Wakanda battle rhinos will have a similar, charitable effect for species of endangered rhinos in the world.
