MOBILE, Ala. (WALA) – Michael Woods said he never intended to have so many cats. He said his now-ex-wife got the first ones around 2018. And then they took a few more at their home near Vicksburg, Mississippi.

Woods added that his wife took in even more strays during a period when he was away from home caring for his ailing mother.

When he got home, he said, he discovered many of the cats were pregnant.

“It’s a combination of a lot of things that have gotten us to where we are now,” he told FOX10 News.

But now those cats have to go. Woods said he was given an ultimatum this week that he would be evicted if he didn’t get rid of them within 48 hours. He said he could negotiate an extension until Monday.

Still, it was a daunting prospect to find homes for roughly 115 cats — Woods says he hasn’t actually counted them. That’s when Allyson Clements came to the rescue. She said she has been involved in cat rescue efforts in Mobile for about 14 years and founded the Mobile Cat Society in 2020. She said she has seen the cats, who appear healthy and well-fed.

“He takes good care of them, and he has them all separated in separate rooms, so they don’t breed and overpopulate, which is incredibly smart,” she said.

Clements said she’s taking some volunteers and a large van Saturday to get the cats, a process she estimates could take up to four hours.

Woods said he is grateful to Clements and other animal rescue groups working to find homes for the cats.

“It’s amazing,” he said. “I don’t even know how to put words, because I didn’t even know something like this would be possible. You know, everyone really made it happen — every single one of them.”

Woods said that since his ordeal hit social media, he has been accused of trying to pull some kind of scam — a ridiculous accusation, he said, because he has never asked for anything but good homes for his pets.

Clements said that as soon as she picks up the cats, volunteers will make sure they are vaccinated, dewormed and treated for fleas.

After that, she said, she plans to give 30 of the cats to a rescue organization in Montgomery. Other groups in Mobile and Foley have committed to taking about 20 others. That leaves 65 cats that will be in foster care until Clements can find permanent homes.

She said she’s taken in large groups of cats before — but never this many.

“We will deal with as many as we can, but we definitely need help,” she said. “We’re a very small organization, so 115 cats is a hit.”

Soon Wood’s cats will be gone—most of them, anyway. He said he plans to keep at least one gold-and-black cat he named Miracle. He said he first thought the cat was dead and then painstakingly nursed it back to health on a bottle.

“There are one or two that I couldn’t let go,” he said. “I’ll probably have to move them, move them over to my dad’s house, basically the two of them. But they are, for lack of better words, the ones that were mine, I guess you’d say.”

Copyright 2024 WALA. All rights reserved.