For decades, a windowless building in Oklahoma was used to torture cats and dogs. Kept in confined spaces, colonies of fleas and ticks were intentionally bred on the backs of thousands of animals to test preventative products. Forced to wear cones so they could not relieve the discomfort of hundreds of parasites crawling on their skin, the poor souls who found themselves there were miserable. The cats who were not being used as a parasite breeding ground had fleas and ticks placed onto their backs to test the efficacy of flea and tick-killing medications.
With less than a handful of staff members to take care of hundreds of animals at a time, the animals were starved of attention. They did not receive adequate veterinary care, and they often did not have enough food to eat. The building was not large enough to house the large number of animals being tortured, so those who did not fit inside were kept outside in kennels 24/7 no matter the weather. Snow and ice, heat advisories, thunderstorms – animals were forced to live in unsanitary cages with no hope for relief.
Multiple cats were kept in cold, empty cages together with no soft items, beds, or toys. The cramped conditions caused rampant disease spread – many of the cats frequently suffered from upper respiratory illnesses that they passed back and forth to each other, and for which they rarely – if ever – received treatment. Despite it all, the cats desperately craved attention from humans, pressing their bodies against the kennel bars hoping that someone would stop to acknowledge their existence.
Little did they know that Beagle Freedom Project was working tirelessly behind the scenes to secure their safety.
When Beagle Freedom Project shut down this lab in 2024, nearly 200 animals were signed over to our care, never to be tested on again. Almost a quarter of the animals rescued at the time were cats. In the years leading up to 2024, Beagle Freedom Project had rescued individual cats and dogs from the facility when we could. Because the cats were not spayed or neutered, there were frequently litters being born, and while this was useful for the laboratory to bring new life into the world to test products on, they did not always have capacity to house them. Beagle Freedom Project would step in and save who we could.
Each time Beagle Freedom Project took an animal or litter from this lab, we vowed to the animals we left behind that we would come back for them. And in 2024, we kept that promise.
Since then, we have been working hard to ensure that these survivors don’t even remember the horrific treatment they experienced before finding sanctuary at Freedom Fields. We have opened the cages and created wide open free roaming spaces for the cats, with abundant beds, cat trees, toys, and blankets. They nap in hammocks on the windowsills and explore the predator-proofed outdoor catios whenever their hearts desire.
From having never seen the sun or played with a toy to lounging peacefully at the top of a cat tree and feeling the warm sun on their fur whenever they so choose, the resilient cats of Freedom Fields have finally found the lives they had always hoped for. These survivors now have one thing that no animal used in laboratories gets to experience: autonomy. They get to choose how to spend their time and who to spend it with, where to take a nap, what toy to play with. To watch the cats at Freedom Fields is to see peace, comfort, and contentment that can rarely be seen elsewhere.
Providing this quality of life for these cats while they await their forever homes is a group effort, and you can help!
Through our Sponsor A Kitty program, sponsors help us provide toys, nutritious (and enough!) food, cat trees, veterinary care, and even upgrades to our cats’ living spaces to keep these incredible survivors healthy and happy until they are finally adopted!