Big cat-astrophe

NEW YORK (AP) — An 80-pound cougar was removed from a New York City apartment where she was being kept illegally as a pet, animal welfare officials said Monday.

The owner of the 11-month-old female cougar surrendered the animal on Thursday, Kelly Donithan, director of animal disaster response for the Humane Society of the United States, said in a news release.

The cougar, nicknamed Sasha, spent the weekend at the Bronx Zoo receiving veterinary care and is now headed to the Turpentine Creek Wildlife Refuge in Arkansas, officials said.

The Humane Society coordinated with zoo officials, the state Department of Environmental Conservation and the New York Police Department on the big cat’s removal.

“I’ve never seen a cougar in the wild, but I’ve seen them on leashes, smashed into cages, and crying for their mothers when breeders rip them away,” the Humane Society’s Donithan said. “I’ve also seen the heartbreak of owners, like in this case, after being sold not just a wild animal, but a false dream that they could make a good ‘pet.’”

Donithan said this cougar was relatively lucky because her owners, who live in the Bronx, recognized that a wild cat is not fit to live in an apartment and surrendered her.

“The owner’s tears and nervous chirps from the cougar as we drove her away painfully drives home the many victims of this horrendous trade and myth that wild animals belong anywhere but the wild,” Donithan said.

Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Basil Seggos said that while cougars “may look cute and cuddly when young, these animals can grow up to be unpredictable and dangerous.”

TME – Because who doesn’t want an 80-pound jungle cat in their third-floor walkup?

Monkey munchies

SANGEH, Indonesia (AP) — Deprived of their preferred food source — the bananas, peanuts and other goodies brought in by tourists now kept away by the coronavirus — hungry monkeys on the resort island of Bali have taken to raiding villagers’ homes in their search for something tasty.

Villagers in Sangeh say the gray long-tailed macaques have been venturing out from a sanctuary about 500 meters (yards) away to hang out on their roofs and await the right time to swoop down and snatch a snack.

Worried that the sporadic sorties will escalate into an all-out monkey assault on the village, residents have been taking fruit, peanuts and other food to the Sangeh Monkey Forest to try to placate the primates.

“We are afraid that the hungry monkeys will turn wild and vicious,” villager Saskara Gustu Alit said.

About 600 of the macaques live in the forest sanctuary, swinging from the tall nutmeg trees and leaping about the famous Pura Bukit Sari temple, and are considered sacred.

In normal times the protected jungle area in the southeast of the Indonesian island is popular among local residents for wedding photos, as well as among international visitors. The relatively tame monkeys can be easily coaxed to sit on a shoulder or lap for a peanut or two.

Ordinarily, tourism is the main source of income for Bali’s 4 million residents, who welcomed more than 5 million foreign visitors annually before the pandemic.

The Sangeh Monkey Forest typically had about 6,000 visitors a month, but as the pandemic spread last year and international travel dropped off dramatically, that number dropped to about 500.

Since July, when Indonesia banned all foreign travelers to the island and shut the sanctuary to local residents as well, there has been nobody.

TME – A monkey uprising, eh? Sure – it’s been that kind of year.

Not so lucky

ROME (AP) — Border police at Rome’s main airport on Sunday prevented a Naples tobacco shop owner suspected of running off with a customer’s winning game ticket from boarding a flight to the Canary Islands, Italian news reports said.

The man didn’t have the filched card worth 500,000 euros ($580,000) on himself, but he did have a plane ticket for Fuerteventura, one of the Spain’s Canary Islands, the LaPresse news agency said.

The man, who hasn’t been identified, was wanted for investigation of suspected theft. The man allegedly snatched the ticket and dashed off on his motor scooter after the customer on Friday had asked the shop in a working-class neighborhood of Naples to verify the win, which is the top prize.

The older woman had purchased two “scratch and win” cards. She asked a shop employee to verify the win. The employee then passed the card to one of the shop’s owners for a final check, Italian news reports said. But instead he allegedly kept the card and raced off on his motor scooter through Naples.

He is now free on his own recognizance, LaPresse said.

To thwart anyone from illegally cashing in, authorities at the Italian tax office which runs the “scratch and win” operation froze the entire block of card numbers that had been distributed to the tobacco shop.

Investigators are still looking for the game card.

TME – Who’d have guessed such a well-thought-out plan could fail?