Biiiigggg Cats!!

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

Today I went with my family to visit Cat Tales, in Spokane, WA. It's a zoological training center, not really a zoo, and not a school, but sort of a non-profit combo organization of both. It's an awesome place, I have thought about attending it. Anyways, most of the big cats here are rescues. They have amazing stories!! :nod:

The park has 48 predators! :hyper:

Sooo here are the shots I got. Sorry they are sorta blurry, these are from a different cam than I normally use.

First up, a crazy looking kitty with hair on his ears.

In other words, a caracal. Very cool animal, starting acting just like a house cat when one of the students came by... rubbin on the wire and such. :wub:

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

A cerval... I love their ears even more than caracals. So huge. He was takin a nap in the shade. :wub:

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

Here is one of their Barbary Lions... also taking a nap.

He was on his back like a big dog!! And then next to him on the right... there actually is a dog! Funny thing is, they used to live together, were trained together, ate together.. everything! Even funnier? The dog was too dominant so they had to seperate them!! :lol:

Also.. this lion was an MGM lion at one time, used to be brought to exhibitions and such. :thumbs:

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

This... is a "Tigon"! She is half tiger, half lion. Obviously not a natural occurance, and didn't happen at this place... they rescued her. They said she shows the personality of each, and you can see she also shows physical features of both species. Striped, lion tail, lion face, tiger ears.. blah blah. Kinda neat.

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

Weee!! Look at the beautiful jaguar. He was sittin very precariously balanced on his log. :flex:

This is Thunder, he's awesomely 10 years old recently.

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

The only "non-cat" at the place... a black bear cub they also rescued. The stuff on his back is leftover winter coat. He was way cool. :thumbs:

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

Another jag... this time giving itself a bath. It was so cute!!! :wub:

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

Now I've saved the best for nearer the end... these are some of my very favorite animals. Tigers!! WEEEE! :hyper:

Here is one of the Sumatrans.

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

I like this pic.

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

This my ultimately favorite type of tiger, the Bengal. :drool:

They are amazing creatures. And this one was dunking itself. SO cute. Especially when it started to jump around and splash and play... :lol:

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

And here are the best pics I got... of the white Bengals. I think they're beautiful, but I don't love them as much as oranges, because they aren't natural.

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

Wowie.

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

Last one of the amazing big felines that walk this earth. *happy sigh* It was a good visit. :nod:

Sorrell · Jul 28, 2004

WOW!! I am so jealous! I love tigers so much, Bengals are my favorite too, I used to want to work at that tiger rescue place in Florida when I grew up

)
I have a question...what kind of rescues are they? Like one's that people tried to keep as pets :sly:

Are any of them "tame" :thumbs:

juliethegr8t · Jul 28, 2004

Yeah, a lot of them were pets. This one story was so great... this guy had a brand new Ferrari, and he put his tiger in it, realized he forgot his cell phone in the house... aaaaand came back to find $20,000+ of damage to his brand new car. :lol:

Serves him sooo right. Also, others of them were kept at like roadside zoos, or just places with cats who couldn't properly care for them. One of them had been kept in 6 months of his own waste in a 6x6 foot stall with a 4 foot roof. Ugh. :sick:

Some people... :no:

They're all pretty tame, have hands on with the kids and trainers for a few hours in the morning and at night. They're all fed treats by hand and such, and clicker trained. So they loooove people.

Biiiigggg Cats!!

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