I'm a guy, and in my lifetime I've taken care of well over eighty cats. No, I don't work at an animal shelter, but we have a lot of feral cats in our area because of the remote location from towns and the abundance of farms out here. People will adopt a cat, not like it, and instead of returning it, just set it free out in the country. This all started with the next door neighbor adopting two cats. Shortly thereafter, they kicked the cats out the door when they couldn't stand the dander. They moved over to our yard (one of the few that are fenced in in this neighborhood) and we took care of them, hoping they could keep the rampant field mouse problem under control. Two soon became six, then it continued to escalate from there. At the height, we had about 40 cats running around, then someone started to develop the land behind us and dumped some "unknown chemical" out and the cats got into it and the number dropped down to less than ten. (We called the Health Department, EPA, and the township about it, then we got kicked around with who's jurisdiction it fell under until someone dropped it on the Army Corp of Engineers who did absolutely nothing and stopped returning phone calls after that first attempt)
At least a dozen new cats are born here, and about 1-4 actually survive to adulthood because of traffic and other animals that prey on kittens (such as raccoons, skunks and possums and the neighbor's dogs), so the number has stayed steady for a few years now. The group that remains now is among the most friendly we've had over the last eight years, and they actually don't mind any human contact. So remember the good karma you are building up from taking care of your cat, because there are thousands a year that don't get such an opportunity to be cared for.
