New Delhi: The Big Cat Rescue, an animal sanctuary in Florida, US, featured on the hit Netflix show “Tiger King”, has announced that it is closing down after thirty years. Animals in the sanctuary will be moved to the Turpentine Creek Wildlife Refuge in Arkansas.
The Big Cat Rescue, run by Carole Baskin, is a centre which has been rescuing exotic cats since 1992 and is currently home to more than 50 big cats including tigers, lions, bobcats, and cougars. Most of the animals in the sanctuary are abandoned, orphaned, saved from being used for their fur or retired from animal shows.
In a Facebook post, the sanctuary said that running such a centre “involves a significant amount of fixed overhead” and that the “cost per cat” rises with the decline in cat population which “becomes a less and less efficient use of donor funds”.
The Big Cat Rescue stated that it has entered into an agreement with another sanctuary named Turpentine Creek Wildlife Refuge in Arkansas and will shift its big cats there. The centre said it plans to fund the construction of enclosures at the Arkansas sanctuary and provide financial support for the care of the animals.
“This will allow us to maximise the degree to which we can fulfil our mission by focusing all of our efforts on the third prong of our mission, i.e., donating to in situ projects to save big cats in the wild from extinction,” the statement read.
The centre added that the decision is emotionally and financially challenging for them.
The Turpentine Creek Wildlife Refuge announced that it has agreed to receive 35 cats from the Big Cat Rescue. “Turpentine Creek will be taking in 35 cats from Big Cat Rescue as part of our expansion plan, building a sustainable future for animals rescue,” the sanctuary said in a Facebook post.