That's Wild!

The Cat's Meow

Bobbie must have been a very cute kitten.

She'd been rescued in the Thistle Dam Flood of 1983 and taken home by a family who thought she was cute and would make a great pet. But instead of settling down and behaving like a regular house cat, their new "pet" just became more wild as she grew up.

Bobbie wasn't a regular house cat at all. She was a bobcat -- a wild animal who could never adjust to life as part of a household. Once her new "family" took her home, Bobbie was caught in an impossible situation: She couldn't adapt to domestic life, but she was now used to being around humans. It was a situation that could be lethally dangerous to her and to people, which is why keeping wild animals like Bobbie is totally illegal.

Her people tried to manage her, but they just made matters worse, first by declawing her and then by locking her in a mink cage where she languished for five years. Finally she was discovered by Salt Lake wildlife rehabilitator Jan Caputo. "She was almost dead when I first saw her," recalls Jan.

The six-year-old bobcat was taken to Utah Wildlife Rehabilitation where she became part of Jan's wildlife program for the next eight years. But Jan has now had to suspend her operations because more and more people have been moving into her neighborhood and a promised new property fell through. Her work will be sorely missed.

Before closing her facility, Jan found good homes for most of the animals in her care. Except for Bobbie. Now 15 years old, accustomed to being around people, yet still liable to exercise her wild instincts at the blink of an eye, the bobcat was hard to place.

"She would have had to be destroyed," said Jan. "But we really wanted to give her one last chance. So we called Best Friends."

Bobbie soon received a permit to come to the sanctuary and join the Best Friends educational program. She moved into a special new enclosure where she can be as close to the natural world as possible.

"She's really enjoying watching the squirrels and rabbits and birds around her," says Sharon St. Joan, wildlife rehabilitator at the sanctuary. "As well as her regular diet, she especially enjoys treats like grapes and cantaloupe.

Bobbi lived happily at Best Friends until she crossed over the Rainbow Bridge in 2002. Now she resides peacefully at Angel's Rest, the sanctuary's pet memorial park.

Bobbie's educational message is really very simple: Wild animals can never become pets and should be left in the wild. Injured animals should not be handled except by licensed experts.

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