TAMPA, Fla. — A Pinellas County woman spends her days dealing with the county’s huge feral cat population.

Jessica Kelly says she and her fellow volunteers with Cat Trap Fever have trapped about 10,000 of the cats and had them spayed or neutered, given their vaccinations and then released.

The goal is to ensure the cats are healthy but also to make sure they can’t have offspring that will make the feral cat issue worse.

On a recent morning, Kelly was setting up several traps at a Largo mobile home park. She has trapped cats in the neighborhood previously and she figured there were about 100 feral cats.

Kelly placed canned tuna on a cardboard base in the traps.

“Bait at the back, then a little drizzle and a little drizzle further back,” she said. Then she sprinkled a catnip like powder on the tuna. “And just a little bit, a little line of that. They call it Kittikrak,” she said. “It just makes them go crazy.”

A few minutes after putting out her first trap, Kelly caught her first cat.

“So, this is a cat that is already ear notched, I think. His left ear is tipped,” said Kelly. That tipped ear means the cat has already been taken to a vet and neutered. Kelly simply placed some drops of flea medicine on the cat’s neck and released it.

Kelly said she spends anywhere from 60 to 70 hours per week catching feral cats and taking them to veterinarians’ offices. She has such a love for cats, she has several large cat tattoos.

“I love how absolutely intelligent they are,” she said. "I have kind of a soft spot in my heart for those who never asked to be born and yet they are surviving through some terrible risks.”

Kelly caught several more feral cats that same morning. Those cats had not been taken to a vet to get fixed.

Park resident Rick Dominiak has helped Kelly keep track of the feral cats near his home. He is a fan of her work.

“Unless there are people like Jessica that’ll come in and volunteer their time and take time to get spayed or neutered, it’s just going to get worse. The population’s going to grow.”

Her work dealing with feral cats is almost all consuming, but Kelly seems to thrive on it.

“It’s kind of like the mafia,” said Kelly. “Once you are in you just can’t get out. I feel like I have a responsibility because I know how to effectively trap, neuter, recover and return cats. It prevents so much suffering and relieves such a burden.”