Roundup Curbs Tangier Island's Community Cats

TANGIER ISLAND, Va. (AP) -- For volunteers who descended on upon Tangier Island to help residents deal with hundreds of "community cats" that have bred on the low-lying Chesapeake island, it was a bit like, well, herding cats.

The cats aren't really strays because most are fed by residents, but there are almost as many cats as humans on the island.

So, more than two dozen volunteers spent a week trapping as many as 100 a day and spaying and neutering them. The operation was coordinated by the nonprofit Best Friends Animal Society and drew volunteers from as far as Florida and Utah, where the society is based.

In all, about 300 of the island's more than 400 cats were sterilized, the tips of their left ears snipped off to show they
had been fixed.

(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)