POCATELLO — Bannock Feral Friends will soon be building a cat sanctuary to help save a colony of feral felines.

Mercedes Biehl is the Bannock Humane Society foster coordinator and works closely with other animal advocates in the area like Bannock Feral Friends director Katie Henry.

Through close-knit associations with other animal activists such as Jeannie Pena and Bannock Humane Society medical coordinator Cathy Angle, a massive amount of volunteer work has gone into helping spay and neuter feral street cats. Henry, specifically, works tirelessly to ensure that these cats are healthy and happy and that many of the friendly felines can be relocated and adopted by a loving family.

“Our focus was to basically track the animals, fix them and then release them to their colonies,” Biehl said. “But if (Henry) finds any friendly (cats) she works with me as well. (We are) making sure the animals are fixed because when they are not getting fixed, they are suffering. It’s really hard to see.”

Biehl continued, “We see a lot of times where we find them and they have stomatitis and they’re very, very sick. I actually had to euthanize one a couple of weeks ago that was a year old because it was suffering so badly.”

Stomatitis refers to inflammation of the skin inside the mouth, which presents with ulcers that can cause pain and difficulty drinking and eating.

Through a specialized rate provided by Mountain View Veterinary Hospital in Pocatello, Henry will take stray cats that she or other volunteers have trapped and bring them to the hospital for spaying or neutering. Henry will keep the cats for a few days if needed to ensure they are in good health. Henry will also occasionally work with the All About the Animals Coalition to help fix the strays.

In March 2023, Bannock Feral Friends were called out to a hoarding situation where a colony of 15 feral cats had been abandoned in an overstuffed house for approximately five years.

At the time, Bannock Humane Society secretary Billie Misevcis was heavily involved in helping the cat colony and decided to bring them to her residence, which she had just recently purchased. Misevcis temporarily housed them in her garage and built a cat patio to accommodate the feral family, attempting to get them acclimated to humans by giving the strays love and attention.

Misevcis passed away in November 2023 and her house was sold. Now, the 15 stray cats are being allowed to temporarily stay in the garage of Misevcis’ former home, but are in need of a permanent safe haven to call home.

“Our goal is to get a large shed and then build a patio for these 15 animals,” Biehl said. “We’re hoping to find someone who’s a volunteer electrician to help get everything laid out. We might also need help from other trades to come and help get everything up to code. It might also be used to help other feral cats as funds allow.”

The goal is to construct the sanctuary and have it finished sometime in April or later this spring but the timeline for completion is still tentative. While the current tenants at Misevcis’ old home are allowing the cats to reside on the property, Biehl and other animal advocates are desiring to get them moved to a more permanent and accessible space.

Even when completed, the cat sanctuary will rely on the contributions of dedicated volunteers like Henry who spent a lot of their days ensuring that these friendly felines get the best care possible. Feral Friends and the Bannock Humane Society still need support from the community through donations and through dedicated time to their cause.

“Any amount helps and we have established a GoFundMe, which we’ve raised $600 for,” Biehl said on Friday. “We’re just hoping for everyone to come together as a community. Katie has done so well taking care of the animals in the community. I feel like it’s our time to help her and these animals in need.”

Biehl continued, “It’s just coming together and helping each other out in the community because it’s a small group of us, and there’s never enough of us. There’s never enough help. If (anyone) wants to come volunteer, (Henry) could really use the help because it’s just her out there trapping cats. It’s a lot of work. Or people can help through donations. We need to come together and help the animals.”

As of Monday, 14 people have contributed $720 to the fundraiser’s $10,000 goal. The GoFundMe is accessible by visiting For anyone interested in donating to the Feral Friends cat sanctuary they can donate to their gofund.me/982bee52.

Biehl and every other animal caretaker that has been invested in the process of helping these cute cats have a brighter, more secure future do it because of their love of animals. Despite seeing the tragedy associated with sick and terminal cats there is a lot of good that this group does to save and assist their furry friends.

“It’s just our love for animals,” Biehl said. “We’ve seen the good and we’ve seen the bad. The amount of suffering that we’ve seen with sick animals (is tragic) because people don’t want to be responsible and fix the animals and because of that they breed and breed and we have to deal with these really sick cats and see them suffer.”

Biehl continued, “But I also do it for the good. You find them really good homes and you (experience) the reward that you get from it. For these particular animals, they’re a colony, they’ve been through a lot together and we want them to stick together. This will also be (dedicated to the) memory of Billie, because Billie really cared about the animals and was such a big part of the rescue. We want to honor her as well. It comes from a place of caring for the animals and (having) passion. We don’t do it for the money, we don’t get paid. We do it because we really care. This could be the start of something even bigger. It’s all just dedication and wanting to be there for the animals and be their advocate because animals can’t talk. We have to be their voice.”