Ten years ago, two volunteers at the Jefferson City Animal Shelter saw a need in the community to trap and neuter feral cats. Since then, more than 4,000 cats have gone through the program.
Jennifer Tergin and Jackie Fischer were volunteers and members of the board for Friends of the JCAS at the time, and they noticed a lot of feral cats coming into the shelter.
"We hated seeing the numbers at the end of the year of all the feral cats that were euthanized, and we wanted to find a way to help the shelter decrease those numbers and to help the cats be able to live their lives without having to die because there weren't any other options," Tergin said.
Tergin and Fischer started Wild Thing - Feral Feline Fix, a trap neuter return, or TNR, program for feral cats in the Jefferson City area.
Tergin, Fischer and volunteer Donna Payne operate the program, working with members of the community to find, trap and neuter feral cats before returning them to their territory. Wild Thing works primarily in Jefferson City and Holts Summit but has also helped cats in neighboring communities such as Brazito and Taos.
"It seems as we get more of Jefferson City under control, we have more time to help people in the surrounding communities as well - because this is not a localized problem," Tergin said. "Basically, worldwide, there's a cat overpopulation problem."
An estimation of how many cats live outdoors in the community is difficult, but Wild Thing has a way to make sure they don't trap the same cats twice - each cat has the tip of its left ear clipped so it's either flat at the top or has a small notch in the point of the ear.
Of the more than 4,000 cats that have gone through the program, most are returned to their territory, their "home," but Tergin said when they trap kittens, they can become adoptable.
"If we can catch them at a young enough age and they can be socialized, we do find them homes or take them to the animal shelter to get them homes," Tergin said.
If someone in the community contacts Wild Thing about a wild cat colony or any stray cats they may have seen or are feeding, Tergin or one of the others will set up a time to bring out traps and catch the cats.
Then the cats are taken to one of a few places - the Spay & Neuter Clinic in Eldon, the Spay Neuter Project in Columbia or the Westside Veterinary Clinic in Jefferson City. Occasionally, cats are taken to the JCAS.
Tergin said Westside works well with them, offering special prices on the surgeries, and often, the Eldon clinic will mark off entire days for Wild Thing to bring in large numbers of cats at once.
"With feral cats, you don't always know when you're going to catch them, so it's hard to make appointments sometimes," Tergin said. "We will spread out, the three of us, and we'll each pick a place we've been meaning to work on, and it's not uncommon for us to get 20-25 cats done in a day sometimes. It's nice when we can accomplish that much."
Vet costs are, on average, about $25 per cat. This includes the surgery to spay or neuter the cat and a rabies vaccination, which is required by law. The cats recover briefly at the clinics, but every cat goes home with one of the Wild Thing volunteers the evening of their surgery.
The cats spend the night at the volunteers' homes and are provided with food and water while they recover. Then they are returned to where they were found.
While the group receives donations from supporters, the Heart of Missouri Humane Society and the Friends of the JCAS, some costs like gas and cat food come out of the volunteers' pockets, Tergin said.
The group also provides outdoor shelters for cats if people in the community request them.
"If there's cats in a certain area that don't have a garage or a barn or a place to take shelter, we do make shelters and we supply them to people who need them," Tergin said.
TNR programs provide a great benefit to not only the cats but the community as well, Tergin said.
For the cats, preventing pregnancies can help them survive in the wild. A female cat can become pregnant as young as 4 months.
"A mother cat can give birth in March, and then by the fall her kittens are pregnant. It gets out of control very quickly," Tergin said. "It completely wears down their bodies. Some of them are already struggling for food, and most outdoor cats are going to have some sort of parasite that is already working against them."
Neutering can prevent territorial male cats from fighting.
"You're not going to see the big, fat-cheeked tom cats with missing ears and battle wounds all over them," Tergin said. "They don't have as much to fight about once they're neutered."
As a whole population, being spayed or neutered and vaccinated increases colony health.
"We love coming back six months later and seeing a group of fat, healthy, shiny cats versus ones with their hipbones sticking out and unkempt coats," Tergin said. "They're able to focus all of their time and energy on keeping themselves healthy and alive."
Keeping feral cat populations in check also benefits the community. For those willing to feed stray cats, it keeps the numbers down; and for those who don't want large numbers of stray cats around, it prevents new litters.
It also saves the city from having to trap and euthanize feral cats, saving tax money, and when colonies are returned to their territory, they prevent other unfixed groups from moving in.
Despite the benefits, TNR was technically illegal in Jefferson City before March 2019.
The city's leash law, before last March, prevented any domesticated animal from running at large. So by trapping, treating and releasing the cats, Wild Thing was breaking that code.
In March, the Jefferson City Council passed a "community cat" ordinance that allows people to register as caretakers of colonies of stray cats, which can be treated by a vet and released. The registered cats are exempt from the leash law.
"So if Animal Control gets a call from a concerned neighbor or someone brings in a cat from a certain area and it has been ear-tipped, it's going to help them identify who they should contact regarding that animal," Tergin said.
Tergin estimated there are around a dozen registered cat colonies so far, but she said there are definitely more out there.
The Wild Thing program has significantly reduced the number of feral cats that are euthanized at the animal shelter, veterinarian Dr. Jessica Thiele told the News Tribune when the ordinance was passed.
For those interested in taking care of feral cats, Tergin said to make sure they are fed, preferably cat food, and given fresh water, which can sometimes be even harder to come by than food. She also urged people to contact Wild Thing as soon as possible if the cat hasn't been ear-tipped.
"If you are feeding a stray cat, email us," Tergin said. "Let's get the cat fixed now versus after she's had a litter or two of kittens and we have to come catch 12 of them. Don't wait."
Wild Thing can be reached at [email protected] or through its Facebook page.