Did You Know? In One US Shelter's Records, Black Cats Were Adopted Least and Euthanized Most

Shelter workers have said it for years: black cats wait longer. In 2020 three researchers put the claim to the records of an urban public shelter in Kentucky, 7,983 cats admitted over 2010 and 2011, and published the result in the journal Animals.

Taken as a whole, coat color barely predicted what happened to a cat. But the comparison between black and white cats was significant and not small: black cats had the highest euthanasia rate and the lowest adoption rate of any color, white cats the lowest and the highest. Brown, gray and orange sat in between.

Cookie · Editor-in-chief

I would like it noted that black cats are the same cat with better lighting requirements.

Nora · Adoption desk

One myth the study checked and dropped: the Halloween effect. The 1,219 all-black cats in the sample did not do better in October. Their adoptions that month were comparable to, or lower than, the rest of the year.

• One shelter, one US state, two years: the authors do not claim it speaks for every shelter, and neither do we.
• What it does show: at the extremes, color still tilts the odds, in the direction the folklore predicted.
• What you can do with it: if you are choosing at a shelter and two cats are equal in your eyes, the black one has been waiting longer, on average.

Our adoption guide walks through the visit itself, from the questions to ask to the first week at home. Bring a good lamp.