Despite "no pets" policies at most colleges, students often sneak cats and other small animals into dorms. But what happens when the student leaves school for breaks, transfers to another school, or graduates? Too often, the pet is left behind.

When cats are abandoned, they frequently lose their domesticated nature after a few months. It's difficult to catch and adopt them. And just two feral cats, says Sue Wilcox, a spokesperson for Caring Hearts for RIT Homeless Cats, can lead to more than 2,500 cats within five years because cats can have multiple litters each year.

Caring Hearts has been "managing" the feral cat colony at RIT for six years. They have approximately 13 active volunteers who feed the cats every night.

The group catches the cats and then brings them to a vet to be spayed or neutered.

"Then we release them," Wilcox says. "You can tell a managed feral cat because the universal sign is a clipped ear tip."

Capturing the feral cats and bringing them to a shelter like the Humane Society at Lollypop Farm wouldn't solve the feral cat problem, Wilcox says. It's hard to be sure all of the cats in the colony have been captured, leaving the remaining cats to form a new colony, she says.

"This way they are managed, since the goal is to keep the colony size down," says Wilcox.

And the cats taken to the Humane Society would likely be euthanized, she says.

Caring Hearts holds fund raisers to help defray the costs of spaying and neutering, as well as to buy food and supplies for a colony that consists of about 30 feral cats at RIT. They will be holding their "Clutter for Cats 2008" garage sale on Saturday, August 9, and Sunday, August 10. Before students leave campus for the summer, they donate the items they don't want to haul back home with them - clothes, furniture, and small electronics - to sell at the garage sale.

"We have to do this because it costs $35 to spay or neuter a cat," Wilcox says.

Feral cats are a huge problem for cities and towns across the country, but they present an unusual challenge for colleges and universities. Some college administrations are reluctant to acknowledge that they have a feral cat problem, says Adrienne McHargue, a spokesperson for Lollypop Farm. Or they may not see the cats until a large colony has formed, since the cats tend to hide in the daytime. Spokespeople at both Nazareth College and UR said that they were not aware of feral cats on their campuses.

"I used to work at RIT and it was a couple of years before I realized that feral cats were living right outside my window," says McHargue.

There is a misconception, McHargue says, that abandoned cats are capable of surviving in the wild without much human intervention. Besides becoming prey to other wild animals, feral cats have an especially difficult time coping with Upstate New York winters. The normal lifespan of cats can reach 15 years or longer, but it's less than half that for feral cats.

RIT has been supportive of Caring Hearts' efforts and students have formed Animal Advocacy Group, which raises money for local animal shelters and spaying and neutering efforts, says RIT spokesperson John Follaco.

Clutter for Cats will be held on Saturday, August 9, from noon to 6 p.m. and Sunday, August 10, from 3 to 6 p.m. at Store to Door Mobile Self Storage Company, 50 Ajax Road.