Einhorn - Tiger Time

The Wild Animal Sanctuary is in the High Plains of Colorado. You can see the Rocky Mountains.

Animal sanctuaries exist for different reasons. Like most sanctuary animals, the five hundred animals at the Wild Animal Sanctuary (WAS) in Colorado are there because of problems humans have created. There are only about 3,900 tigers left in the wild, but there are about fifteen thousand tigers living in cages in the United Statesin zoos, in circuses, and in homes, as pets. Its not a good way for any animal to live, but some get rescued and brought to WAS, the oldest sanctuary of its kind in the world.

Since 1980, WAS has rescued and cared for lions, tigers, bears, leopards, jaguars, mountain lions, and some smaller carnivores such as wolves, servals, bobcats, lynx, foxes, coyotes, and coatimundi. There have also been alpacas and horses, a few emus, several ostriches, one porcupine, one raccoon, and one camel. (Youll also see hundreds of prairie dogs poking their heads up from their burrows, but they havent been rescuedthey just live there!)

The people who run sanctuaries are serious about their work, but they wish they didnt have to do it in the first place. They wish there were no need for animal sanctuaries and that the world was safer for animals. They teach people about the animals situations and encourage them to help.

There can be plenty of heartbreak in any sanctuarys story, but there are also lots of happy endings. The more you know about why sanctuaries are important and what people can do to help, the better off all animals everywhere will be.

Each sanctuary is different, but they all do some or all of the following things, in the order below. WAS handles all four phases:

• Rescue: Humans step in, remove animals from harm, and bring them to safety. Rescue situations are usually emergencies.

• Recovery: Licensed wildlife caregivers treat the animals for injuries or illnesses, create a recovery plan, and let them rest and heal.

• Rehabilitation: The caregivers encourage the animals natural instincts. Some wild behaviors have to be taught, while some animals simply know what to do. Sometimes the animals must learn by watching one another.

• Release: Caregivers help animals live in their natural habitats (or as similiar to that as possible) the way they were meant to.

Wow. Its 3:30 in the morning and thirty-nine of you have just arrived at the Wild Animal Sanctuary (WAS). Now there are eighty-eight of us living here... on 789 acres of rolling grasslands.

Welcome, new tigers. Im Kamal. Im a mellow fellow.

Weve never had such a large group of tigers come here at one time. I could hear your huge trailer trucks bumping and clanging through the half-frozen dirt roads of our habitat, your cages loaded carefully inside. You had been traveling for twelve hours straight, with your rescuers taking turns at the wheel, and giving you food and water along the way.

My name Kamal means perfection, beauty, and excellence in Arabic. In Hindi, it means pale red.

I bet it got warm in those trailers, but soon youll experience December on the High Plains of Colorado, and out here, its absolutely freezing. When the sun comes up youll see the Rocky Mountains in the distance. Their snow-capped tops are pointy, and in certain light the rock looks a little purple. Since all of us tigers descend from frigid, rocky Siberia, Colorado is a very nice place to be.

You couldnt tell from your cages at the back of the trailer, but the humans driving these trucks are so tired that their whole bodies ache. At their feet were a dozen empty Styrofoam coffee cups. Theyd bought drinks quickly at truck stops, because they drove straight through to get you here as fast as they could. They didnt want you to be in your rescue cages any longer than you had to beyoud been in cages for long enough!

Your trailers were banging along on roads that go right along the fence of my habitat, so I could walk along the edge and follow you as you moved by. Some staff vehicles, like the food and supply trucks, go along this road all day, so my two habitat-mates, Simon and Sophie, and I are called the driveway tigers.

The animals all know when the forty-foot (12-meter) rescue trailer trucks arrive. Every time. The humans are always surprised and amused by our reactions. Were like a welcoming committeewe rush to the fences at the edge of our habitats and celebrate in our own ways. We tigers come to the fence and put our front paws up and stare. The lions roar and bellow; the ground vibrates. Wolves howl