BERKELEY COUNTY, S.C. – More than 120 feral cats from the streets and woods throughout Berkeley County were trapped, caged, and brought to the Charleston Animal Society’s Berkeley Campus over the weekend. They were taken in as part of the “Trap, Vaccinate, Alter, and Return” (TVAR) event at the shelter, meant to help with animal population control county-wide.
“These are the community cats that end up getting pregnant having kittens, then those kittens flood the shelters,” said Shelter Operations Director Christina Ellwood. “These events are great, especially in early spring, because we try to get these animals spayed and neutered before they start having kittens.”
Christina Ellwood says this TVAR event was staffed by two veterinarians and four technicians from the Massachusetts SPCA, who performed the surgeries, as well as volunteers handling cat information intake and pre- or postoperative care.
“Cats were originally wild animals, so a lot of them that are coming through this program are considered feral or wild. Usually, they make their home by some sort of food source. Some colonies are managed by people who go out and feed them, or they end up around a dumpster, and that’s how they get their food,” said Ellwood.
Eventually, volunteers or the caretakers of feral cats will release them back into the wild. In addition to being spayed or neutered, the cats are now microchipped and have a year’s worth of rabies vaccine in their body.
“Studies show that if you remove the cat colony, more cats will just move back in. But if you return cats to their colony, they won’t allow new cats in, and eventually the colony dies off,” said Ellwood…