Oak Harbor resident Don Pierce is trying to find a home for his mother’s cats. And she had a lot of them.

He has spent the past several weeks trapping the felines living in his mom’s Camano Island home. They scatter and hide when he tries to catch them, so he relies on humane traps. In that time, he has captured 30 and he expects to find more in the coming days.

“I want to find them homes,” Pierce said last week after opening the trunk of his car and showing the latest half dozen cats he had trapped.

The number he’s captured doesn’t include the 23 that volunteers from the Camano Animal Shelter Association recently pulled out of the home, bringing the total to 53 and climbing.

It’s been a difficult time for his mother. She spent the past several weeks in the hospital and the bank has foreclosed on her home. She fell and broke her femur and needed a hip replacement. He said she still has several weeks left in the hospital.

Pierce, who runs an Aikido studio in Oak Harbor, hasn’t told her yet that he is trying to find homes for all her cats.

Finding a home for so many felines is proving to be a daunting task. He has contacted animal shelters in Stanwood, Whidbey Island and Camano Island and they couldn’t to take any more cats.

“We helped them out as much as we could with the resources we have,” said Tegan Locker, shelter manager for the Camano Animal Shelter Association. Of the 23 cats CASA volunteers captured, 15 were sent to NOAH, a Stanwood-based shelter.

She said it appeared the cats were well-cared-for and the house was in good condition. Most of the cats were spayed and neutered and they had microchips.

Pierce said NOAH loaned him several traps to capture the felines. He has been making regular trips to Camano Island to empty the cages that are placed inside the home. Often, he finds more than one cat crammed inside the cage.

Sheri Bibich, executive director for the Whidbey Animal’s Improvement Project, said she admires Pierce’s efforts to find homes for the cats.

“Actually what he’s doing is very admirable,” Bibich said.

She said WAIF wasn’t able to take the cats at its Coupeville facility. She has been looking for farmers who have barns that might be a good home for some of the cats.

The Whidbey-based animal shelter has a continual problem with the numbers of cats that need to be picked up. There is a waiting list for cats who need a home. Only  in dire situations can WAIF help.

“We will take any cat that doesn’t have a food source,” Bibich said.

She has seen other situations like the one Pierce is faced with. There have been past instances where dozens of cats had to be removed from homes.

Pierce hopes he has finally captured all the cats from his mother’s house. On a recent visit he was only able to trap one cat.

He now has approximately 30 cats in his Oak Harbor home, all housed in one room. They seemed shy, preferring to gather in boxes and pet carriers. He said they haven’t been aggressive and his family hasn’t received a single scratch from them.

Pierce is making some headway in trying to find a home for his brood of cats. He found an organization in Mount Vernon willing to take a half dozen, but he is still trying to find homes for his mother’s remaining cats.

People wishing to help Pierce find a home for the cats are asked to call 279-9276.