My Dad Was a Private Detective

 

When I was in grade school my father (Vern) was a Private Detective and our family believed in raising their own kids so after school, instead of ending up in daycare, I ended up on stakeouts with my dad. I learned to look for clues and to notice patterns in behavior. It has served me well, but this set of clues has me befuddled. As you know from the Safari Guide, Precious and The Great Pretender are litter mates who we rescued from an auction where they were being bid on by taxidermists. They were 6 months old when they came home with us in October of 1992. They were already vicious, so we never handled them when they were young.

 

It wasn't until 2010, when Pretender was being checked out for neurological issues that we discovered he had been declawed on the front and one toe had been declawed on the back. Well, that was weird, but we didn't think much of it. Then, back to back Precious ended up on the Observation Chart for a malformed claw and Pretender was on the chart for not eating.  I created a video that is 23 minutes long that shows you the lengths we went to in order to clip Precious' nails, without sedating her. At 21 years of age, we really didn't want to sedate either of them because the sedation can be very dangerous.

 

Pretender's issue was not as easy to assess, so he had to be sedated for a full blood work up, sonogram and rotten tooth extraction.  While Jamie and I were trying to wake him up, which took more than 6 hours, we began wondering aloud about why someone would have these two kittens, probably as pets, and yet one was declawed on the front, and one toe on the back and the other kitten had all her claws?  Maybe Pretender had been declawed front and back and just had some grow back in.

 

Maybe the people realized after the surgery just how scary it is to sedate a cat (did they have to finish before they were done due to some emergency?) or maybe they just felt so bad about doing that to him, that Precious was spared?  If they cared so much, then why would they offload the kittens at an exotic animal auction where taxidermists would bid on cats to turn into den decorations?  Who knows?

 

What we do know is that Precious and The Great Pretender have lived long healthy lives here; thanks to all of you keeping such a close eye on them and because of the great care you give all of the cats.

 

Jamie and Dad had a great love of plants.

 

Hi, I’m Carole Baskin and I’ve been writing my story since I was able to write, but when the media goes to share it, they only choose the parts that fit their idea of what will generate views.  If I'm going to share my story, it should be the whole story.  The titles are the dates things happened. If you have any interest in who I really am please start at the beginning of this playlist: http://savethecats.org/

 

I know there will be people who take things out of context and try to use them to validate their own misconception, but you have access to the whole story.  My hope is that others will recognize themselves in my words and have the strength to do what is right for themselves and our shared planet.  

 

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Music (if any) from Epidemic Sound (http://www.epidemicsound.com) This video is for entertainment purposes only and is my opinion.