Cats with no cradle

They had been trying to catch the homeless mother cat for over two hours. Finally, a can of sardines lured her away from behind the bricks and a homeless man netted her. As the cat thrashed around in the net, she did not suspect that minutes later she would be reunited with her kittens in a home that has plenty of food and love to spare.

For Hal and Shirley Brown, it was just another night of trying to help homeless cats and dogs in Panama City Beach. The Browns are members of ASRAL - Animal Sterilization and Rabies Assistance League - a group started on the beach in 1985 that strives to humanely control the beach's homeless cat and dog population. Cats and dogs are captured, given shots, sterilized and, if possible, given homes.

Homeless cats far outnumber homeless dogs, and finding homes for dogs is not a problem compared to some of the cats, which are too wild to tame. A cat that has too great a fear of human beings is re-released in an area where ASRAL members take turns tending to it by putting out food and water.

The Browns were focusing their efforts in such an area Thursday night when they caught the mother cat and her three kittens. A homeless man named Grady Pippin lives in the same cat-infested area and helps the Browns catch the cats.

"We've been feeding these cats down here for two years," said Hal Brown. "This is one of a hundred places where these cats are at. We usually come down here five nights a week. We don't trap anymore than we can find homes for." They did not want to disclose the exact location for fear the cats would be killed or more cats might be dumped there.

(Photo: The Browns use an old trap that carries the scent of cats.) Buy Photo

Trapping cats is not a cheap and easy business. Aside from dealing with the heat and mosquitoes, there's the equipment they have to carry from their car - including dry cat food, sardines, two gallons of water, a net, a kennel, and two cage-type traps. The Browns paid $150 for a trap, and $160 for the net. The other trap is a loaner from the Bay County Humane Society.

"The Humane Society has been good to us," said Shirley Brown. "They have a program called Castaway Cats which is similar to ours. It's a capture-spay or neuter-and release program."

As they enter the area around 6:30 p.m., Pippin greets them and tells them that another ASRAL member was by around noon and left piles of dry cat food spread out on bricks, lumber and scrap metal. Hal Brown replies that trapping the cats would prove more difficult since they've already been fed.

Pippin agrees and says the cats are in hiding. "They hear so much noise, and they're being shy. They'll look at you, turn their heads, and then they're gone."

The Browns walk throughout the area looking for cats they've come to know and others, including young kittens, they have yet to meet. Scouting the area helps them decide what cats to trap.

"They've got names," says Shirley Brown, standing near a scrap metal pile. "We go through the alphabet. Such as "A" for Albert, "B" for Bill. We've gotten up to Freda with the females."

Some of the cats have already been treated and returned. Vets are reluctant to physically mark the cats for identification purposes, because they fear they might become infected. Pictures are taken to keep up with who's who. "Alice is around here. She's been spayed. Kyle's been neutered," says Shirley Brown.

After talking with Pippin, they estimate there are probably 10 males and 10 females in the area living among heaps of scrap metal and concrete blocks.

"The males are all over the place, but they're not coming out," says Pippin, carefully surveying the area. "They're smart - they know something's going on."

The Browns decide to focus their efforts on a black-and-white female and her three kittens. Rounding up the kittens is fairly easy. The food lures the inexperienced critters out and the Browns simply pick them up. "We like to get kittens around four weeks," says Shirley Brown. "It takes about a week to tame them."

The mother cat isn't so cooperative and hides behind a large pile of cinder blocks.

"She's slick. She knows all the holes over there," said Pippin, pointing to the bricks bordering a wooden fence, where there are holes large enough for cats to escape through.

In an effort to lure the slender cat, the Browns place her three kittens in a kennel near one of the traps. They opt to use the rusty Humane Society trap, because as Shirley Brown explains, it has been used to catch a lot of cats and has a cat scent which she feels will attract the cat. Sardines are placed under the wire-mesh cage floor, so the cat will have to work at the food so much she'll set off the trap bar. Hal Brown remarks that the trap is so sensitive - a kitten can set it off.

Now comes the waiting.

"Sometimes we go off on errands and come back about an hour later to check on the traps," says Shirley Brown.

The mother cat peers out from behind cinder blocks and carefully walks over to the kennel to check on her kittens. When Hal Brown approaches with a net, she watches his every step with glaring eyes and takes off running when he gets too close.

In the past, people have seen the Browns at work and offered assistance. Some have given money, others food. A person living nearby the area hasn't been so nice. The Browns were harassed and threatened. "There are people here who just hate cats," says Shirley Brown.

A nearby parking lot has served as a dumping ground for kittens. Shirley Brown says she's personally seen kittens being dumped there and that people have purposely run over the cats, which often come out at night in search for food.

There is a calico with a broken leg that has been here for three years. She points out the cat as the sun begins to set. Its right front leg was twisted and gave her a limp as she walked. They call her Mama Cat and she's eluded traps in the past.

Pippin smiles and says that Mama Cat brings him two kittens every night. "Shirley told me she's trying to protect them from the males."

In a cat colony, male cats will often kill young kittens that are not their offspring and who they perceive as a competitive threat, explains Shirley Brown. "My goal is not to have anymore kittens here next year," she adds.

A trap at the opposite end of the area goes off. Hal Brown has placed a towel over the trap to keep the cat comfortable inside. When he lifts the towel, the cat hisses and strikes the cage. Shirley Brown takes a closer look and decides that it's a mother cat that must be left behind. "If she's lactating and we don't have the kittens, then we have to leave her behind," she says. "Otherwise, the kittens could die."

Hal Brown opens the cage and the animal takes off like a shot.

Captured female cats are taken to the vet and tested for lactation prior to being sterilized. If the cat is lactating and they don't have the kittens, then the animal is returned. The process takes about six hours, during which the Browns worry that any kittens left behind might go hungry or be killed by a territorial male.

Around 8:30 p.m., the street lights cast long shadows and it looks as though the mother cat will not be caught. It becomes a familiar scene: the mother cat goes to the kennel, but will not go into the trap.

At one point, the kittens get upset and shake the plastic kennel on the bricks. The mother cat approaches and sidesteps the trap once more. Hal Brown and Pippin walk toward the kennel with net in hand, but the mother cat darts between the bricks and crawls under the fence.

"She's not going anywhere, so long as those kittens are there," Pippin says, peering in between the bricks.

Shirley Brown has had enough and decides to put the whole can of sardines out. Around 9 p.m., the mother cat approaches the sardine tin, takes a fish and as she begins to eat, Pippins nets her.

"She wasn't going into that cage," says Hal Brown.

When the Browns took the mother home, the situation changed - now she didn't want to leave the cage.

"But the kittens lured her out," Hal Brown announces, including two other kittens the Browns already had who are nursing on the mother cat with the others.

Shirley Brown happily reports that the mother cat now has a name. "It's Jeannie Moe and the little Moes. We'll keep her a while and get her spayed and then try to find a home for her or turn her loose in the world."

The Browns currently have five inside cats and take care of seven cats that remain outside. Their food bills average $40 a week. Sterilizing a cat and getting shots, such as a rabies vaccination, costs around $100 per cat.

"They're reducing the animal population," said Dr. Rick Smitherman, a veterinarian at Animal Care Center in Panama City Beach.

The 50 or so members of ASRAL take turns looking for cats and dogs from the Phillips Inlet bridge to the Hathaway Bridge.

"We need help - we need more members. We need a no-kill animal shelter on the beach - that is our big goal," said ASRAL member Linda Cilbrith.

"The animal shelter in town is always full," said Cilbrith. "We can help a lot by having our own shelter on the beach. It's hard for these animals to survive out here. It's such a transient area - people are always leaving animals behind."

According to the National Humane Education Society one unspayed female cat and her mate and all their offspring, producing two litters per year with only 2.8 surviving kittens per litter can total: within one year 12; within two years, 67; three years, 367; four years, 2,107; five years, 11,801; six years, 66,088; seven years, 370,092; eight years, 2,072,514; nine years, 11,606,077.

"We're going to be overrun by these wild animals, unless someone gets involved," Cilbrith said. "I live on the beach and I want to help make a difference. These creatures are all out there suffering."

ASRAL relies on donations and proceeds from an annual yard sale. Anyone interested in adopting from ASRAL members can visit their Web site at www.ASRAL.org