Angel’s Camp CA.  Yesterday it was bears and today it’s all about elephants.

The captive wildlife conference, hosted by PAWS, has been interesting.  Day one was all about big cat issues.  Howie gave an excellent presentation and then both of us served on a panel with Carney Anne Nasser from the Animal Legal Defense Fund, Bill Nimmo from Tigers in America, and others.

 

I’m thankful that our part went first, so we can just relax and enjoy the rest of the conference.  I appreciate that they have provided wonderful vegan fare, which is becoming more and more standard at animal protection events.  I find the breaks and ice breakers to be the best networking and am grateful to be part of such a wonderful group of people who are working to end the abuse.

 

We were each asked, at the end of our panel to summarize what was important to us.  I asked for a show of hands as to how many in the group of 200+ were involved in sanctuary work.  About 70 percent raised their hands.

 

I told them how we educate people for an hour and a half about the plight of the cats and then hold their hand through the process of calling their member of Congress to ask that they champion the Big Cat Public Safety Act.  I then said, if all the people who raised their hands would do the same thing, we could fix this problem.

 

I then suggested that if the people who didn’t raise their hands were donors, that they demand their charity do the real work of ending the trade at its root.

 

As I came off stage an elderly little wisp of a lady came up and took both of my hands in hers.  With tears in her eyes she said that she’d traveled from Chicago to Tampa just to see Big Cat Rescue.  She said her older brother drove her from his home in FL to see us and that their 2 hour tour had been life changing.  She just kept saying, over and over how much she loved what we are doing and how much she appreciated our efforts.  I was deeply touched.

 

The same day LaWanna had forwarded a Facebook message to us that said:

 

“I want to thank you for educating me about the real issue with the beautiful big cats.  I have a sincere and deep love for them,  tigers especially.

 

Being naive to the facts,  I am guilty of contributing to the problem.  I recently visited Browns Oakridge Zoo in Illinois.  I believed that I was fulfilling my dream of holding a baby white tiger.

 

After my visit there,  I saw your Facebook page.  I have been following you every day and I am learning so much about the problems.  I feel so bad for the cats at the Browns Oakridge Zoo.  They are breeding these beautiful creatures,  and stealing them away from their mothers so that naive people like myself will come to take pictures with them. I was horrified at the tiny cages (jail cells) that they are born to spend their lives in. As I stood outside of the cages and looked into the eyes of the cats, I could see and sense their utter sorrow. I pray that God and the cats will forgive me for my contribution to the problem.

 

Thank you for giving me a way to help these cats. I have followed your link to your petition and have asked my Senator and Representatives to champion your bill.

 

I live in Salt Lake City, UT.  I hope to be able to make my way to Florida  to visit your rescue some day and to personally thank you for all that you are doing for the beautiful big cats.

 

Thank you from the bottom of my heart.  - Tina B

 

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 tha