OTTUMWA — Dogs, when turned loose, generally become scroungers, stomachs with a nose attached.

Cats, on the other hand, become hunters. If they don’t have food, they’ll find it and kill it.

That explains why Jeff Williams, Ottumwa’s animal control officer, wishes people would quit feeding stray cats. They’re getting the food people leave as well as the mice and birds they hunt. The result is a population boom for feral cats.

“We’re having a major, almost an explosion of the cat population in Ottumwa,” Williams said.

Things aren’t to the same point as they were in Randolph, Iowa, when the town made news earlier this year for offering a $5 bounty for every cat people brought in. Ottumwa has no such bounty, and Williams isn’t proposing one.

But he does want people to understand that if they’re feeding the cats that roam their neighborhood, they’re contributing to a problem. They also may be putting themselves at legal risk if the cats hurt someone.

Ottumwa’s animal ownership codes define an owner as someone who is responsible for an animal. That includes anyone who encourages or allows stray animals to remain on their property. In effect, feeding the stray cats makes you their legal owner.

“You’re taking ownership of these animals by allowing that,” Williams said.

For those who are not feeding the cats and want them off their property, Williams said there are limited solutions. You can’t shoot or poison the cats, but live traps are an option.

The traps aren’t perfect. And they can’t be set without permission from Williams. In practice, he’s not inclined to deny permission to use a trap on a person’s own property. But it still goes on a case-by-case basis.

And Williams has a handful of recommendations for those who want to use live traps. The first is to engrave your name or attach a durable card with a wire before using it.

Williams picks up five or six cat traps per week. If he has to collect two or three in a day, it’s easy to get the traps confused. Identifying yourself on the trap ensures that you get it back.

There’s another reason to have an ID on the trap. Some will be stolen by people who think it is cruel to trap a feral cat. That’s why Williams recommends setting the traps in a place where casual passers-by will not see them.

That’s also one of the reasons Williams wants people to set the traps at night and check them first thing in the morning. Doing that on weekdays ensures the cat stays in the trap a relatively short time. It is harder to get an officer to the property on weekends, and that can mean the cat stays in the trap longer than it or the property owner wishes.

Even Williams admits traps aren’t the best solution.