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Bibbie, a feral cat, eats food Rhoda Nelson left out on the front porch of her Wolfe Street house in Fredericksburg.
Animal control officers warn against feeding feral cats because they'll rapidly multiply. But Nelson's neighbors |
By EMILY BATTLE
From her front porch on Wolfe Street, Rhoda Nelson watches the daily movements of the cat colony that has made a home in her neighborhood.
Inside, she's got her own cat, Molly, but Nelson can't bear to watch the feral cats that scamper around outside go hungry.
She leaves a little dish of food on the corner of the porch, which the cats visit for meals several times a day.
"What can you do when somebody drops a cat out and you've got the cat and the kittens? I don't want the cats to starve," said Nelson, who has lived in the neighborhood for three decades.
Feral and stray cats live in neighborhoods all over the Fredericksburg area. In the city, you can spot cats darting in and out of crawl spaces under old buildings, holing up in backyard sheds or slinking through trash bins looking for food.
Local animal control officers warn against feeding feral cats, pointing out that left to themselves, the felines will just multiply at an alarming rate.
But in Nelson's neighborhood, compassion for the animals is tempered by a desire not to watch their ranks grow larger.
So on the other end of Nelson's porch, a humane cat trap sits ready for action, a sign of an effort that neighbors hope will ensure that their new feline neighbors will stop breeding.
Over the past two months, residents of this block of Wolfe Street have met at dusk several nights a week to stalk and trap members of the feral cat colony.
It started with three female cats, and within a matter of months ballooned to around 18.
Eight residents of the neighborhood, along with just as many friends and relatives--some of whom had never even seen the cats--contributed money to have them spayed or neutered and vaccinated.
They've also bought food and litter for friends who agree to keep the cats in their homes until they're ready to either be adopted or released back into the neighborhood--minus the ability to breed and spread disease.
Not wanting to watch the cats starve or tear up their garbage looking for food, the neighbors found few alternatives to this approach when they called around to the city and local animal shelters.
Doing nothing didn't seem to be an option, either.
"If we hadn't caught all those kittens within a couple of months, we could have had 40 to 50 more cats," said Kelly Baker, who lives on Sophia Street and has been helping her neighbors on Wolfe Street. "If you ignore the problem, it's only going to get worse. They're going to keep reproducing and you're going to have a lot more starving kitties with a poor quality of life."
In Fredericksburg, as in Spotsylvania and Stafford counties, stray cats are considered "free-roaming animals," just like skunks and possums.
City ordinance prohibits "any dog or other animal" from running at large, but cats are specifically exempted from the leash law.
Animal wardens in the city and counties will not come pick up feral cats unless they're dead, sick or have clearly become a danger.
They do lend out traps, though, and in Stafford County, animal shelter manager Donna Hart said it's not uncommon for folks to bring in 10 to 12 cats at a time that they've trapped.
Outside of government, residents can find groups and individuals to help them manage feral cats living in their neighborhoods.
Rappahannock Humane Society President Thea Verdak promotes the method that the Wolfe Street neighbors are using of trapping, neutering or spaying and then releasing the cats back into the wild.
She said the Humane Society can direct concerned residents to organizations that will provide these services for a fee or donation. She said calls to her organization for the service are endless.
"It's pervasive," Verdak said. "There are strays and ferals everywhere."
Verdak said she and volunteers at the Humane Society also will help folks trap cats.
But there are so many out there that she and most of the other organizations she knows of that provide the service have a waiting list.
"I could be working for the next six months and not even take any more incoming calls," Verdak said.
Once the cats have been trapped, the medical procedures needed to control a population don't come without a price.
In the Richmond area, a nonprofit volunteer group called Operation Catnip performs these procedures for free--asking only for donations.
Closer to Fredericksburg, the most affordable option appears to be the Virginia Kincheloe Spay and Neuter Clinic in Spotsylvania, where it costs $40 to spay or neuter a cat.
Immunizations for rabies and distemper and testing for Feline Immunodeficiency Virus--the feline equivalent of HIV--cost $10 to $12 apiece.
Clinic staffer Jenna Louderback said the clinic gets a lot of calls about feral cats, and has set aside Mondays through Wednesdays specifically for spaying and neutering ferals, although they encourage people to schedule appointments.
On Wolfe Street, neighbors called around to friends and family to gather up the resources to take care of their cats.
Baker said she sent an e-mail to all of her friends, and several agreed to "sponsor" cats by paying for spay or neuter services.
Two weeks ago, they were down to trying to catch, spay and neuter the last of the three original mothers and her new litter of kittens.
Then last week, a cat that had run away from the colony returned.
Wolfe Street resident Suzanne Moe said neighbors are eager to trap these last cats, along with the male that has fathered their kittens--before they find themselves with a whole new batch of kitties to trap.
To reach EMILY BATTLE:
Email: ebattle@freelancestar.com
