Sarah Roberts Rockford Register Star

Posted Mar 25, 2008 @ 11:28 PM
Last update Mar 26, 2008 @ 08:01 AM

ROSCOE — For the past eight years, Dotty McCullough has carefully tended to dozens of feral cats that roam throughout the village.

McCullough and a handful of her friends trap the felines, take them to a local vet for spaying or neutering and vaccinations, and then release them. “Friendly” cats are adopted out to friends and family or turned over to the Rock County Humane Society for adoption. Wild cats are returned to the outdoors, where McCullough and Company feed them each day and keep an eye on their health.

Although no one in the group is a full-time animal rescuer, they have spent thousands of their own dollars and countless hours tending to the felines, ensuring that they are fixed, healthy and, when possible, placed with owners in an effort to curb the village’s wild cat population.

They see their work as a solution to some of Roscoe’s pet problems, not an added burden.

Village trustees, who are updating Roscoe’s animal-control ordinance, agree, and decided Tuesday to give McCullough and her fellow rescuers a special distinction.

The proposed new ordinance outlines stricter rules for having pets and levies fines against people who keep wild animals on their property and those who regularly feed them. However, the village will allow McCullough and her friends, through a special permit or some other village license, to continue the work they have been doing for almost a decade.

“I know we come across as crazy cat ladies, but we just really love our animals,” McCullough said. “It’s irresponsible people who don’t take care of their cats and then throw them away where they multiply and get out of control who cause the problem. People like us ... should not be punished.”

McCullough rescued her first cat in 1991, when she was driving to work one day and saw a kitten in the middle of the road, trying to scrounge some food out of a discarded french fry bag. She took the kitten home, fixed it up, found it a home, and “it just escalated from there,” she said.

McCullough and her friends each work with different groups, or colonies, of wild cats. Through spaying and neutering and adoption, McCullough has reduced the number of cats in her colony from 21 to two. Another rescuer has gone from 25 cats to 8.

The women place food in humane Havahart traps to secure the cats, then take them to a local vet. On average, each cat costs $100 to fix and vaccinate, and rescuers foot the bill themselves.

The ordinance, which still needs full board approval, allows a maximum of three domesticated pets per household or building within village limits, and only two of a particular species. People who violate the law could face fines of $50 to $750.