A Gardendale woman wants to start a volunteer group to humanely trap and spay or neuter stray cats.

“I would really like to get the community involved in this,” said Sheri Ryan, who has caught and spayed or neutered 22 cats since October in Mt. Olive. She was able to find homes for all but six of the animals.

Ryan usually takes them to a Jefferson County clinic that grants her certificates for a free or discounted spaying or neutering, but she sometimes has to pay out of pocket.

“Ten dollars a cat doesn’t sound like much, but when you add it up, it’s running me broke,” she said. “I’m just a stay-at-home mom with a love for animals.”

Ryan said she has also heard there are about 20 stray cats in Moncrief Park, but that she hasn’t gone there personally because she feels like she would get too involved emotionally and financially.

“I feel like it’s gotten out of hand in the area,” she said. “I feel like a one-woman army.” She said she knows that euthanasia is a “necessary evil,” but wants to save the cats’ lives if possible.

She said many communities have groups of average citizens who round up cats in humane traps and then take them to local clinics to have them fixed. The traps can be purchased at many hardware stores.

The Alabama Spay/

Neuter Clinic in Irondale recently received a grant to provide free cat sterilization to residents of Montevallo.

The clinic provides a free Trap, Neuter and Release (TNR) class every Sunday  for people interested in helping keep the feral or free-roaming cat population down.

“It’s not really a public danger, but I think as we progress as a society we need to address these issues,” said Donald Kendrick, the TNR program manager at the clinic. “It saves taxpayer dollars and it saves animal lives.” He said many people from north Jefferson County, like Ryan, bring animals to the clinic to have them spayed or neutered. The clinic is non-profit, which Kendrick said is a rarity; it has only been around since 2007. However, TNR groups have been around for 20 years.

“People are starting to see that [TNR groups] are really the only way to take care of the problem,” he said.

Ryan said anyone interested in starting a TNR group can contact her by calling 568-8245.