Male Cougar
10/1/2005 – 8/23/2020
On August 23, 2020 Ares was humanely euthanised. Severe liver cancer was found on necropsy despite lab work being moderate.
Ares is the laid back mellow sibling. He likes to hang back and relax while his brother and sister wreak havoc. Ares has the loudest purr of the three cubs. His purring is so intense, his whole body shakes when he purrs! Ares also likes to play with the palmetto stumps in his enclosure and will often rip them out of the ground so he can shred them and bat them around his Cat.a.tat.
A mother mountain lion had been shot by a hunter leaving her three newborn kittens orphans. A rehabber had been given temporary custody of three cougar cubs by Idaho’s Fish and Game Department and three weeks to find them a home in a zoo or to euthanize them. The idea of these magnificent creatures ending up in a zoo where they would be bred for generation after generation of imprisoned animals was more than she could bear.
She visited our web site and was asking herself if death might be more humane than life in a cage but before she made such a decision she contacted Big Cat Rescue. After more than twenty years in her business of rescuing, rehabbing and releasing native wildlife she was no stranger to tough choices, but this one was particularly hard. Because Idaho does not allow big cats to be rehabbed and released they could never go free. If the choice was made for them to live in an accredited facility then how would their sacrifice (life in a cage) be used to stop their kind from enduring persecution by man?
In the end it was decided that the cubs would come to Big Cat Rescue because we can make their story known. Our supporters are active in trying to change the laws that allow animal suffering. These three little orphans are symbolic of why we write letters, donate our time and do all that we do. Visit the page called Cat Laws to help.
See the Rescue of the Three Cubs
at the end of the video above.
Sponsor Ares here: http://big-cat-rescue.myshopify.com/collections/sponsor-a-cat
Bless that woman in Idaho!
Oh I'm so glad they ended up with you.. Curse the hunter.
What a wise woman.Hope the hunter gets what he deserves.
Ares sweet boy. I am so sorry you are gone, but imagine you reunited with Artemis and Orion, running wild and free as you were meant to. My heart, as always, is with all the angels at BCR who loved and cared for him. RIP Ares.
I didn’t know Artemis and Orion had passed. Bummer! I have a cougar plush I bought when the cubs were rescued.
Pity the page doesn’t give details of his death.
He had liver cancer. When they went in to do surgery, his liver was almost completely gone so they decided to let him go.
ALL OF YOU AR BIGCAT RESCUE,BRITTANY AN MRS CAROL AN DEB AN SO MANY OTHERS DR JUSTIN DID THE RIGHT THING WHEN LIVER CANCER ATE UP HIS LIVER HE WAS HUMANELY EUTHANIZED, GOD BLESS ALL OF YOU FOR EVERYTHING YOU DO FOR THESE BEAUTIFUL CATS, I WORK CLOSELY WITH PETA AN THE HSUS IVE SHARED THE NUMBER TO MAKE THE CALL OF THE WILD AN LET ALL 2000 FRIENDS TO JOIN BIG CAT RESCUE TAMPA FL,I WAS SEEING WHEN ARES WAS IN THE OPERATIONROOM AN HEARD FROM CAROL THAT SHE DIDNT THINK ARES WAS GOING TO PULL THROUGH THIS ONE ,I DID TO ALWAYS HAVE THE MOST RESPECT FOR EVERYONE AT BIG CAT RESCUE NO ONE COULD GIVE THESE CATS SUCH A REWARDING LIFE LIKE YOU ANIMAL RIGHTS ADVOCATE FOR ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT
I agree with everything you said May Nace. BCR is a wonderful organization and everybody there are great people. They are so caring and do everything they can to give these cats the best life they can after they have been rescued.
Many years ago I used to take LSD. One day I and a friend thought it would be trippy to drop and go to the Zoo. I was pretty uncomfortable because I could see that the animals were not happy. Then I looked into the eyes of “black panther” (melanistic leopard?) and a vision passed between the big cat and me. I felt something indescribably horrible enter my heart, screamed, and ran out of the zoo crying. I’ve never gone near one since.
There is a Calvin and Hobbes cartoon that shows them at the zoo. Calvin makes some kid remark about one of the animals and Hobbes says, “If humans could put rainbows in cages, they would.”