HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, Fla. — People have been coming to First Ladies Farm and Sanctuary in Riverview to adopt cats for years, but the First Ladies will soon be coming to you.
“The whole concept of First Ladies Farm was we were naming chickens after first ladies of the United States of America,” said founder Chelsea Edmonds.
What started with many feathers has transitioned into a lot of fur. First Ladies Farm went from adopting 13 cats in year one to 1,000 in year five.
“We take them in pairs, all over the state of Florida, and match them to farms and homesteads and nurseries and warehouses,” said Edmonds.
“I have two kittens in the house that we brought back from the edge, the brink, there is no reason for those kittens to be alive and they’ll be up for adoption this weekend and I will probably have some tears,” said Director Claudia White.
The non-profit says they have one big challenge, like most farms, they’re very rural.
“Just don’t get the foot traffic we need to get the amount of adoptions that we need, so this year we had a bus donated to us, a University of Miami former sports team bus,” said Edmonds.
The plan is to turn the bus into a mobile cat adoption center.
“Be able to go down to the Hyde Park market, be able to go to a brewery, be able to go to a music festival,” said Edmonds.
However, cats won’t be the only thing available to take home.
“The doors will open up, and we’ll have a serving window to serve coffee out of the back of the bus,” said Edmonds, who said the wheelchair lift currently on the bus is available to anyone who needs it, free of charge.
The farm has partnered with Hugo Coffee, a company with similar goals.
“$2.50 of every single item sold, not every purchase, every item sold, goes to a different animal rescue; she picks a different animal rescue every week,” said Edmonds.
The only thing left to do is refurbish the bus, and they’re asking for the public’s help through a GoFundMe. For more information, go to Firstladiesfarm.com.
“People plan to go visit their favorite food trucks; we are hoping people plan to go visit the cat bus,” said White.
First Ladies Farm is also holding an Art on the Farm adoption event, including 30 vendors, Saturday, May 13, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
