Animal activists take steps to manage feral cat population

PRINCE WILLIAM COUNTY, Va. - They likely number in the thousands and they are everywhere.

“Every rental complex, every housing development, every strip mall, every dumpster, every trailer park, every mall and every restaurant tends to have a colony of feral cats,” said Sherry Meier, president of the nonprofit SADSAC, an acronym for Save a Dog, Save a Cat, and office manager of the Independent Hill Veterinary Clinic.

“It’s a huge problem,” she said.

And one that Prince William County hopes to address in the near future.

The cats end up in all these places because cat owners don’t spay or neuter their cats, or they leave the area and their cats behind. The cats become feral, almost wild, and leery of people. By the time a feral cat becomes about 3 months old, it is difficult to socialize and therefore likely unadoptable.

“They are afraid of being run over or that people will be mean to them because no one wants them around,” Meier said.

Yet there are always people who will feed them and the more they feed them, the healthier the cats remain, which in turn allows the females to breed and breed.

Feral cats will breed in accordance with their food source. The more available food, the more litters they will have; and the larger the litters, the more female cats will be among them.

“A female cat can literally and anatomically have a litter every 63 days,” Meier said.

Technically you could get 10,000 to 12,000 cats from one female cat.

“That doesn’t usually happen, but it’s possible,” Meier said.

Feeding a feral cat is humane, but animal activists say it’s just the first step. The second is getting them spayed or neutered.

Meier and county animal officials hope to launch a Trap-Neuter-Return program, or TNR as it is commonly called, in the near future that is aimed at sterilizing and therefore reducing the feral cat population, while at the same time saving the county money.

Residents are taught how to safely trap the cats which are then sterilized by local veterinarians participating in low-cost spay/neuter services, then returned to the area in which they had been living.

The program called “One Spay at a Time” would be a partnership between the county and Meier’s organization.

It would initially be funded with the $6,000 collected by the state – from Prince William County – this year through the “Animal Friendly” license plates.

“If we can create more awareness from the public as to where these funds are going, as well as get more donations, we will be able to further our mission,” Meier said.

When it gets under way, participants will likely have to pay a portion of the vet fees.

“Ultimately we would like this program to be free to the residents of Prince William County,” Meier said.

In 2009, the county animal shelter euthanized 483 feral cats. Going out to trap the feral cats, sheltering them while they are quarantined and feeding them before euthanizing them is estimated to cost the county about $30,000 a year, Meier said.

The feral cats that are destined for being euthanized also are taking up a space of another animal that could be adopted, she said.

If the population of feral cats is reduced by TNR, animal officials believe it will cut down on the number of feral cats euthanized at the animal shelter, as well as make additional room for adoptable cats.

“If we can save $30,000 a year in running out and trapping these feral cats by spending $6,000 on the new program, it’s really going to benefit the county,” Meier said.

As an ongoing program, the aim is to see a reduction in the number of feral cats and kittens brought to the shelter and euthanized over the next three to four years.

Meier is now working with local vets to determine who will be interested in participating. She hopes to have it going by the end of the year.

Once the vets are onboard, Meier said they can start feral cat trapping classes, register colony caretakers that the sterilized cats will be returned to and start fund raising.

SADSAC is already accepting toner cartridges for recycling, donations for the program and Meier encourages all to purchase the “Animal Friendly” license plates.

For more information, contact Meier at sadsac01@yahoo.com or visit www.sadsac.org.

Staff writer Aileen Streng can be reached at 703-530-3907.