Just before sunrise Saturday, while other West Seattle residents were gearing up for holiday shopping, Pamela Staeheli stood near Alki Beach with five paper plates filled with Costco cat food in one hand and a jug of water in the other.

While her neighbors slept, Staeheli settled into her early-morning ritual of leaving food and water for this group of more than 30 cats that she has fed for almost four years. She also manages a nearby colony of approximately 15 cats.

The cats are wild and have no names. They eat the food she puts down for them, but only a few of the cats will let her pet them. Most will never make a good housecat. She has trapped all of them long enough to have them spayed or neutered.

Cats born outdoors to stray cats are considered feral. According to DVM Magazine, a veterinarian publication, one female cat and her offspring can exponentially produce more than 400,000 kittens during a seven-year period.

In addition to managing the two feral colonies, Staeheli founded Feral Care four years ago. She and fellow volunteer Nancy Howard recently attained non-profit status for the group.

Caring for these cats has cost the women thousands of dollars. They are in the process of building a shelter, with isolation rooms for sick cats, play areas for kittens and cages for cats awaiting foster care. In recent months, they faced a neighboring business owner who wanted the cats gone and racked up thousands of dollars in veterinary expenses.

The ebullient Staeheli, gregarious and youthful, defies the stereotype of the crazy old cat lady. Besides her successful housecleaning business, she said, the cats are her biggest responsibility.

"I made a commitment to the feral cats of West Seattle," she said. "This all started four years ago when I noticed several cats in an alley that had been abandoned by their people. I want to do right by them."

The responsibility includes, said Nancy Howard, efforts to trap the animals so they can be spayed or neutered. The effort, known as Trap-Neuter-Release, assures that a managed colony's population does not explode. Alley Cat Allies, which is a national resource organization for these programs, estimates that 2,000 groups and 6,000 people practice Trap-Neuter-Release.

Leaders of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals endorse strategies like Staeheli's in certain situations, but on their website they also say: "Having witnessed firsthand the gruesome things that can happen to feral cats and to the animals they prey on, PETA cannot in good conscience oppose euthanasia as a humane alternative to dealing with cat overpopulation."

For Staeheli, letting the cats in her two colonies die in municipal shelters is simply not an option.

Feral Care traps and neuters approximately 100 adult cats monthly and returns them to their old colonies, finds a new colony or places them in a feral refuge. Socialized kittens born to feral mothers are placed in homes through Friends of the Animals Foundation. The group accepts donations to its veterinary fund earmarked by Lein Animal Clinic.

Feral Care's options are only as open as there are residents willing to help.

"We are in need of foster homes and landowners willing to relocate a colony to their property. Ferals make excellent barn cats," Staeheli says.

The group also seeks volunteers to help with trapping, cleaning, computer programming, grant writing, data entry and clerical duties. To volunteer or donate to Feral Care, visit http://www.feralcare.org or call 459-7202.

Sarah Wyatt is a Seattle freelance writer who can be reached via wseditor@robinsonnews.com