My Time at the Cat House (and I Don't Mean the Brothel)

Although I got little sleep the night before due to some kind of respiratory attack toward some mystery allergen lurking in the cat cabin, I jumped out of bed right at 8am because today was the day I was eagerly anticipating: the day of behind the scenes cat exploration, including feeding time. I'm sure many of you readers are thinking "gross!" or "so what?" or "this girl has some screwy ideas of what constitutes a good time," all of which are fair reactions, but this type of observation is invaluable for helping me get a clearer picture of lion behavior for my novel. And, some of you may know that I grew up in San Diego, home of the world famous San Diego Zoo, and some of you may even know that I'm a bit of a "zoo girl" (or at least that's what my mom always called me). The smell of the zoo (that particular blend of soft serve ice cream and elephant dung) is an olfactory trigger for childhood memories, so you can see, that this kind of thing is right up my alley. And besides, I'm sure you can all agree that getting see these big, monstrous beasties chowing down like they do in their natural habitat (or as close as you can come to natural within the confines of captivity) is a pretty unique, exciting, one of a lifetime kind of experience. Needless to say, I was stoked.


As soon as I heard their trucks, I raced outside, leopard print coffee cup still in hand. They pulled up in a bobcat hooked to an open bed trailer holding hunks meat, some with the calf legs still attached. Even before they arrived, the cats were rapidly pacing back and forth in their enclosures. The Exotic Feline Rescue Center has two fast days for their cats in the summer, and one of them was the day before, so these kitties were hungry. The keepers corralled the cats into a smaller partition (which took some calling and coercing, particularly for Brumby, the somewhat ornery black leopard), and then entered the main enclosure, checking water, cleaning up messes, and depositing carcass meat. When they were let back in to the main cage, the cats immediately set upon the meat, licking it with their big tongues in an almost delicate fashion before picking the hunk of meat up in their mouths and dragging it to a safe, high up spot. Only then did they start chewing on it. 

One note on their "delicate licking": although as an observer it looked rather genteel and reserved, the reality is that the tongues of these big cats are so rough that they can take the flesh off of bone, and can certainly draw blood if licking a living thing. This new bit of trivia is getting filed away, and, for those of you who know my novel so far, is, unfortunately, going to result in some minor revisions to a key scene.


After they were done feeding the furry friends in my neck of the woods (literally) I walked down with Melissa, one of the keepers, to watch as they fed another group of tigers, lions, and leopards. I was then invited to accompany them to the storage facility, where they keep all of the meat, and to the portion of the center that remains unseen by the general public. This part consists of many more animals who aren't seen by the public, either due to limited space or the animal's skittishness around crowds. 


Like the weirdo that I am, I was most eager to see their cold storage. "Can I take pictures?" I asked and Melissa shrugged in acquiescence. Then I slipped between the plastic slats in front of the door and went to town, snapping pictures of the mounds of cow parts, the shelves of whole dead chickens, the blood drain in the floor. "I'm probably one of the few people who want to take pictures in here, huh?" I said to Melissa. "You'd be surprised," she said. "I have pictures myself. I took them, and never look at them." I gleefully snapped away. 

**WARNING**

The next few images are not for the squeamish. Viewer discretion is advised.

I apologize for the shoddy quality. I edited them in iphoto for maximum impact, but for some reason they wouldn't upload once I did.

The Center gets their meat from local farmers for free. The Center provides the service of hauling away dead livestock in exchange for keeping the meat. They do all the processing themselves, raising the body up on a meat hook and butchering it with a saws-all and small butchery knives. The cats eat the meat off the bone ("They're too spoiled to eat the guts," says Melissa). Sometimes they'll eat the livers, but for the most part, all of the offal goes to compost, which the Center makes in piles and gives away to people for gardens. "We can't sell it," says another keeper, Jennifer, "because we can't guarantee the purity of it's content." They burn the bones and scrap to cut down on the maggots before adding them to the compost.


After seeing the cold storage, Jennifer took me out to the rest of the enclosures. Just like Joe, Jennifer has a special relationship with a lot of the cats. Particularly with the tigers, although as she confesses, "Boy tigers tend to prefer women." It doesn't go both ways, apparently, except when the female cats are in estrus (heat). When they are in heat, and being difficult, Jennifer says that they'll sometimes ask one of the male workers around the Center to call to them, "and sure enough they come scampering over right away." Most of the keepers I saw were women: aside from Joe, the only men working the Center appeared to be builders and maintenance workers.

Jennifer leans in for a smooch with one of her favorite tigers

Even with her special talent with the cats, Jennifer says that there are some cats she won't go near. "Some cats just don't like certain people." Also, some of the most dangerous cats are the ones that are the most friendly. When big cats play, they play rough. Another tour guide explained, "Imagine you're inside the cage. A friendly tiger might come over to you to greet you. He'll stand on his hind legs and put his paws on your shoulders. That's 600 lbs. worth of force on you. So naturally, you'll fall down. Then he'll start licking you, to show his affection, (with that flesh-removing tongue of his). He might even bat at you with his paws to try to get you to play. He won't let anyone near you, because he'll be protecting you. Then, as any good parent cat would do, he might try to pick you up by the scruff of your neck to take you to safety. Those teeth can be as long as 9 cm long, going right into your neck, and severing your spinal cord. And then you're paralyzed, injured, bleeding out in a cage where a massive cat won't let anyone get in to help you." Although Jennifer is affectionate and playful with the cats, she is very conscious of their behavior, and which ones are troublemakers. In one enclosure, for example, she demonstrated the tigers' keen ability for stalking. She tried to catch the eye of one of her favorites, who was lounging in his tank. Then she crouched down with her back to the cage. He leapt out the start stalking her, but immediately, another female tiger, who was closer, started to race over to her, and she stood up immediately and moved away from the cage. "You see? The moment my back was turned she tried to get me." This was one of the tigers that she wasn't particularly keen on too. 

He may look like a harmless house cat right now but don't be fooled. Also, white tigers tend to be a bit of a neurotic and unpredictable. Consequence of inbreeding.

Tigers are silent when they're stalking. Jennifer told me that save for a small rustling occasionally, when her back is turned she won't know they're there, "until I feel tiger breath on the back of my neck." Chill inducing! The rest of the time, though, tigers are pretty vocal. Happy, friendly tigers make a "chuffing" sound, kind of a deep, throat, staccato purr. They also make bleating, whining kind of howls, and aggressive hisses, and small roars, but it's the lions that are the real roarers. I was lucky enough to hear these roars: deep thunderous, bowel-shaking roars that made my heart palpitate with the thrill of it.


Interestingly, although lions are the ones touted as the social cats, they're not as affectionate as the tigers. This is not to say that some of them weren't friendly. Jennifer nuzzled with a couple lions along the way. And a couple of the males were quite affectionate with one another, which surprised me until Jennifer set the record straight. Male lions will live in a pride for quite awhile until it is their turn to leave and find their own. Even when they do find their own pride, they continue to cohabitate with other males until those males either challenge them or move on. 

Bro-mance

The Center has a couple of peculiar lion cases that are specific to captive lions. They have two neutered lions (i prior to coming to the Center) whose manes either fell out or never grew in as a result of the castration.

One of the maneless males. You can tell by his broad cheekbones and prominent shoulders.

They also have a couple lionesses who, after going through menopause, started to grow small manes. This latter occurrence is relatively rare. Apparently, it is something that is more likely to happen in captivity. I would guess that this is because lionesses live longer in captivity, and so are more likely to live long enough to experience menopause. After doing some research on my own, I found that Terrell Jacobs, well-known lion tamer, had a lioness who famously "became a lion," growing a mane and supposedly exhibiting male sex organs. Most likely she was just menopausal (can't explain away the sex organs though, apart from ascribing it to good ol' fashioned circus flim-flammery). 

Lionesses dog piling (or  cat piling?). Notice the particularly hairy one in the middle. She's one of those slightly maney menopausal ladies

Jennifer graciously answered all my questions, and really helped flesh out my understanding of cat behavior. If only I could have stayed a bit longer and observed the cats on my own. But of course, for safety reasons, I needed to have a body guard. I'm scheming to find a way to maybe volunteer with them at some point to get more time with big cats. Stay tuned on that front (Amelia's Marvelous Midwestern Romp: the Sequel?). 


After parting ways with Jennifer, I went back to the main entrance and joined in on a regular tour of the facility, where I was called "royalty" by the guide because I had been an overnight guest. This is because the Center gets very little revenue to stay afloat, and the overnight guests constitute quite a bit of their revenue. Which brings me to my second soapbox moment of the trip (bear with me...no pun intended).


In the last few days, I have encountered two struggling enterprises: the circus (represented by the Circus Hall of Fame) and the Exotic Feline Rescue Center. While both are performing similar functions (the EFRC trying to preserve big cats in this country and the Circus Hall of Fame trying to preserve the history of the circus, and, by extension, the history of those who have worked with big cats in this country), they are near mortal enemies. There is an Israeli-Palestinian style conflict between these groups of people. I heard both sides speak ill of one another openly and unflinchingly. However, I feel that if the two could somehow work together, both of their enterprises would thrive, or at least, be more successful and profitable than they are now.

Gratuitous lion pic

This is what I would propose (if they would only listen). The EFRC is concerned about the treatment of animals by the circus. Fine, worthwhile concern. However, being a believer in the inherent good of most people, I believe that the majority of circus people love their animals and do not wish them harm but, because it is expensive to care for an exotic big cat, and they barely have enough money to support themselves, let alone their animals, their animals don't get the optimal treatment. That is, they don't have acres and acres of land to give their cats. The EFRC is in need of more land to expand into. The Hall of Fame seems to have quite a bit of it. What if these two groups got together and helped each other out? What if the EFRC could set up an annex in Peru, where they could put some of the rescue cats? In exchange, the circus folk could train some of the cats to do tricks, and use them in their performances, thus reviving the lustre of the circus. Many of these rescue cats were circus cats before, and I would assume that if they were treated fairly, the EFRC would not, or shouldn't at least, have any qualms about them performing. They aren't wild cats, after all. They were all born in captivity, mostly in the U.S. And then, perhaps they could even work together to figure out a humane way of transporting the cats so that their show could travel, bringing both the circus and awareness of the plight of America's big cats, to the masses.


Sadly, I don't think my brilliant idea would ever work because the antagonism between these groups runs deep. But, a girl can dream, can't she?


After my second tour of the day, it was time for me to say adieu to my cat friends and hit the road for West Baden, Indiana, another former circus winter quarters. This is where my internet access became limited, and thus why I am getting this entry to you late. I apologize, dear readers. Hang tight, another entry is soon to follow.

Another gratuitous lion picture...aka you bracing for the next exciting installment of my blog.