I too am the opposite of the “kill it!” mentality. There are actually times where it might have been prudent to have just gone ahead and killed something rather than tried to preserve it.

I’m glad the coati wasn’t killed. In many cases we can learn more by not killing anything that is strange, frightening, or unknown. I commend Mr. Austin for having a level head and the foresight to try and capture it rather than shoot it.

As to the human need to “kill it”, I witnessed it first hand yesterday, (not the first time by a long shot, no pun intended). A woman with a small child had entered the bathroom at local clininc, came hurrying out asking that someone please kill the lizard. So, I am thinking, wow, what could it be? We have some good sized reptiles down here in South TX and I thought this would be a great opportunity to catch one in an enclosed area (they are usually very fast and I am not). Up I jumped, then I carefully entered the bathroom intending to find the lizard without scaring it while I formed a plan for it’s eventual capture, quick study and release into a more hospitible habitat. The only problem was, I saw no lizard. “Where is it? I asked the frightened woman. “Over there in the corner.” She replied. I had to sqint very hard, but I finally spied the offensive creature, a tiny, pinkish, gecko, about an inch and a half long. I did an impressive job of not laughing and soon had the dangerous animal in hand, literally. All the while I was being asked to “Kill it, kill it”.

Since the little thing was too fragile for much handling; I carried it outside and released it immediatly near some rocks and bushes. I walked back into the building, to find the terrorized woman still waiting. She wanted absolute confirmation that the creature was indeed gone. And she still couldn’t understand why I didn’t kill it.

Actually, MOST of the time it is wrong-once in a great while it is right. These people are not idiots or monsters—just very human beings with a very human trait that needs to be “deemphasized”.

I for one, am totally glad the animal was not killed. What we need is to teach folks not to fear the unknown.
The great question is—How???

A few years ago when I was in NC some guys were essentially applauded for shooting a capybara that likely was a released bad idea purchase from a recent exotic animal show. One of the men said something to the affect of “we didn’t know what it was, so we shot it.”

Nice to see someone take a better approach and the time and effort to seek a humane solution.

As an aside, 6 years ago, those 2 tigers had come to CPT and were estimated to be about a year old. My wife and I run a dog bakery up the road in Raleigh and they contacted us to make cakes for them. We put about a pound of chicken in each cake, iced it with their names on it. Once the tigers figured out it was chicken, they went to town on the cakes. The enclosure that they were in was only about an arm’s length from the path so you could reach up and practically touch them. It was an incredible experience for us.