Volunteers with Save A Kitty Feral Cat Program check on feral and stray cats recuperating from surgeries and vaccines during a spay and neuter clinic Sept. 15. (Photo Provided)

BELPRE — A spay and neuter clinic held this past weekend in Belpre sterilized and provided other services for more than 100 stray and feral cats from the Mid-Ohio Valley.

The Save A Kitty Feral Cat Program held the clinic at the Belpre Bingo Hall Sept. 15 and that helped 116 cats, according to Save A Kitty Founder Kandi Habeb.

During the clinics “we spay and neuter and vaccinate stray cats and feral cats for people taking care of them” and ask for a $5 donation per cat though it is not required so “basically it’s free,” Habeb said.

Habeb started Save A Kitty in 2004 in Parkersburg when she went out to dinner with her husband at a restaurant and they saw a cat coming out of the restaurant’s dumpster, she said, and they discoverws the cat had three “tiny kittens.”

“It broke my heart,” Habeb said and she discovered she did not know how many feral and stray cats there really were in the area.

Two mobile veterinary hospitals from Rascal Unit wait outside the door of the Belpre Bingo Hall Sept. 15 to provide sterilization services, vaccinations and other medical treatments to stray and feral cats during a Save A Kitty Feral Cat Program spay and neuter clinic. (Photo Provided)

Since Save A Kitty was started, it has sterilized about 9,300 cats through spay and neuter clinics and its spay and neuter program, she said.

During the Sept. 15 clinic, cats were held in cages at the Belpre Bingo Hall and then were taken outside to one of two trucks from the Rascal Unit to get spayed or neutered and vaccinated. Many cats received treatments for fleas and parasites and some even received treatment for medical issues, according to a Save A Kitty Facebook post about the clinic.

The Rascal Unit are independent high volume spay and neuter units that are based out of Dublin, Ohio, according to Habeb.

The Rascal Unit was started in 2006 and consists of two mobile veterinary hospitals that help pet owners and rescue organizations by traveling through Ohio to offer compassionate and affordable pet sterilization and routine veterinary care for individuals in need, according to the group’s website.

Habeb said they get the Rascal Unit to come to Belpre twice a year to offer spay and neuter clinics.

During the clinic, feral and stray cats were brought in by people from Parkersburg, Belpre, Marietta, Coolville and there were even a few from Wirt County, she said.

They will treat cats from whoever is willing to bring them to the clinic, Habeb said. The fact that they were able to spay and neuter 116 cats made “a huge impact”, she said.

Through their spay and neuter program Save A Kitty helps sterilize about 20 cats a month at the Humane Society of Parkersburg’s SPOT clinic, while the 116 cats they sterilized at the clinic equals about how many cats they sterilize through the program in six month, according to Habeb.

“Talk about a huge impact, 116 cats spayed/neutered in one day,” she said.

Sterilizing feral and stray cats is important, according to Habeb, because the Parkersburg animal shelter, though they try really hard to place them, ends up euthanizing most of the feral and stray cats and kittens it receives. She said the Humane Society of the Ohio Valley does not euthanize stray and feral cats but it can only take so many before it can’t take anymore.

Spaying and neutering cats “saves a lot of lives and reduces (cats’) euthanasia rate,” Habeb said.

She also said that spaying and neutering cats saves taxpayers money because less of their money is being spent on euthanasia.

People who want to help fund the spay and neuter clinics and the spay and neuter program at Save A Kitty can do so by participating in its fifth annual 300 Club Raffle, according to Habeb.

Tickets cost $52 and can be bought at Eastern Burkholder Exterminators in Belpre, Mulberry Lane in Parkersburg and through the group’s Facebook page, she said.

Tickets can also be purchased by sending a check with 300 Club written on the memo line to: Save A Kitty, PO Box 1442, Parkersburg, WV 26102, she also said.

The raffle runs October 2024 through September 2025 and involves a weekly $100 drawing where tickets are reentered for each drawing, a $500 drawing in week 26 and a $1,000 drawing in the last week of the raffle, according to information provided by Habeb.

More information about Save A Kitty can be found at www.saveakitty.org, on the group’s Facebook page or by calling call 304-480-9242.