when someone tells her she is the Bob Barker of Warren County.

Not so much the game-show host aspect, but Barker’s famous sign-off from each episode of “The Price is Right.”

“Remember to help control the pet population. Have your pet spayed or neutered, goodbye everybody,” Barker would say after each show.

In five years since the beginning of Paws Rescue’s trap-neuter-return program for cats, more than 1,000 feral felines have been fixed.

There are many more — a daunting task for Conerly and the all-volunteer Paws Rescue. Operation Feral Feline Fix offers no-cost spay or neutering and rabies vaccinations for free-roaming, stray and feral cats. Feral cats are unadoptable, Conerly said. Left to roam, cat colonies will grow.

What this program will do is come to a home or business with a feral cat colony, set up traps — following humane trapping guidelines — take the trapped animals to the Animal Medical Clinic on U.S. 61 North, have the procedure done, then return the cat or cats to the colony when they’ve healed. A small piece of the cat’s ear will be removed to “tag” the fixed cats.

“On average, it takes about seven years to really see the difference,” Conerly said in tracking cat populations.

PetSmart charities awarded Paws a nearly $19,000 grant in August that allowed the organization to fix 300 more cats than originally hoped. Paws also has received grants from the ASPCA and Petfinder.com, Conerly said. The group applies for as many grants as possible, she said, and the money goes straight to helping animals.

Paws, a no-kill organization, is run exclusively by volunteers. It has a Redwood mailing address, but no facility. Cat and dog adoptions are run out of volunteers’ homes. Paws relies on foster families and urges adoptions of shelter or rescue pets. The organization is constantly looking for foster or adoptive parents and urges animal lovers to deliver cat food to the Animal Medical Clinic to help feed the fixed colonies.

There are no shortages of pets available for adoption, either.

“Don’t buy a pet,” Conerly said. “There are always pets that need to be adopted.”

Conerly also is urging dog lovers to help during October’s national Adopt-A-Dog month campaign. Paws — and other shelters including the Vicksburg Warren Humane Society and the Vicksburg Animal Control facility off North Washington Street, have no shortage of adoptable pets. Paws has dogs of every type, size, age and personality.

Paws efforts will extend through October, highlighted by the annual Spooky Pooch contest — with a few proposed wrinkles to liven up the day — on Oct. 29 at The Outlets at Vicksburg. What a better way to show off a rescue than dressed for Halloween.

Conerly may be reached at 601-529-1535. If you know of a feral cat colony or feed feral cats only to see the pack get larger and larger, pay homage to Bob Barker. All it takes is a phone call — or an e-mail.

The task is arduous, adopting dogs and fixing cats, but if we follow Bob Barker, or at least Warren County’s Bob Barker, we can all help make a difference.

So, help control the pet population. Call Leigh Conerly.