JACKSON, MI – Wearing a white hazardous material suit, Sue Chambers stood next to a sliding glass door and grabbed a cat by the nape of its neck.

The frightened animal clung to the side of the door as Chambers attempted to place it in a carrying cage.

“It’s OK. It’s all right,” she assured the thin, orange feline as it was eventually secured in the container and carried to a van.

Chambers, director of operations for the Cascades Humane Society in Blackman Township, and other employees Wednesday morning, June 5, pulled about 60 cats from a home on N. Meridian Road in Henrietta Township. At least six others remained and workers were hoping to catch them with live traps.

The animals wandered two main rooms in the house, filthy with feces and smelling strongly of waste and urine.

Never before has the nonprofit shelter undertaken such a large project. It is not equipped to practice emergency medicine, and the staff is seeking donations and looking for people willing to adopt the animals.

How to help

The Cascades Humane Society is looking for donations to cover medical and surgical treatment for cats rescued Wednesday, June 5. They also need cages for cats and dogs, kitten food and non-clumping cat litter. Donations can be made or delivered to: Cascades Humane Society, 1515 Carmen Drive, Jackson, MI 49202.

A 53-year-old woman owns the house and asked the humane society for assistance. She wants the cats to find good homes and avoid euthanization.

The woman’s 60-year-old husband was living alone in the house until late last week. Diagnosed with Stage V liver cancer, he has been ill and now is in hospice care.

She did not want her name or address published because her husband does not know the cats are leaving the home. He hopes to return to them, she said.

He would feed the cats before he fed himself, she said and called them his reason for living. “He is going to die soon enough. I don’t want to help it along.”

He is so sick, he does not realize the state of the home, she said.

The floors are sticky and littered with garbage and droppings. The odor is almost unbearable and workers had to wear white suits, rubber gloves and respirator masks donated by Chemetall in Blackman Township. Cats crept from almost every crevice and perched on what looked to be a large, wooden play structure enclosed in fencing and sitting in a room that might have been intended for dining.

Piles of litter were heaped in the long grass surrounding the house.

The woman said the hazardous conditions surely worsened her husband’s condition.

She said she had not been to the house since she moved to her mother’s home in December.

She kept in regular contact with her husband, however, and on Thursday, he was not doing well and she took him to an emergency room.

Realizing the condition of the house, which she said deteriorated with her husband’s health, she called the humane society and workers assessed the situation Friday. The organization’s veterinarian went to the home Monday and said the cats needed a quick rescue.

On Wednesday, at least two kittens were dead, and other kittens looked to be in bad shape. Some could barely open their eyes.

The older cats look “pretty good,” Chambers said.

Several are white with “flame point” or orange tails, nose and ears. Others looked Siamese.

Many were resistant to capture. “They aren’t mean cats, they are just scared to death,” Chambers said.

Melissa Woodhurst, the humane society interim executive director, said the cats would immediately be assessed by the society veterinarian and surgical staff.

They will all get a bath and within a week, they will be in “much better spirits,” she said.

The humane society will keep them until they can be adopted. Animals are only euthanized in “extreme circumstances,” Woodhurst said.

Those that do not soon find an owner will be placed in foster homes, she said.

“It feels good that they are treated humanely and we are able to offer support,” she said.

As they were taken from the home, the woman, who has medical and mobility issues, sat in a vehicle and identified the animals. She cooed, called some by name and tried to estimate their ages.

The couple had two cats before they moved to the house in 2003, but the number grew, the woman said, as her husband helped stray or other cats. He would fall in love with them and not want to let them go, the woman said.

At one point, as she relayed her story, her eyes filled with tears.

Cats in cages surrounded her.