Elsa Bobcat

Female Northern Bobcat

Date of Birth: 4/88 – 10/19/04

Elsa in her feeding lockout.

Elsa was purchased at an auction in 1992 and brought to Big Cat Rescue. She originally came from South Dakota, where she had been kept outside in a pen with no shelter from the freezing temperatures. Her ears were so badly frost bitten that they fell off. She appears older than what we were led to believe. She spends her days sleeping and eating in her large, 1200 square foot cat-a-tat with her neutered buddy, The Great Pretender.  In 10/99 she had an abscessed tooth and under anesthesia it was discovered that she only has a couple of teeth left.   She is fed a soft diet and is obviously not going hungry.

TRIBUTES FOR ELSA

“Elsa always reminded me of Grizabella from the Broadway musical CATS. In the play, Grizabella was a very old cat, withered by her age to the point that she no longer resembled the proud, carefree, flamboyant cat of her youth. I always pictured Elsa that way, too.
I met Elsa when she was already 16 years old.  Whenever I came by, I would always see her resting in the underbrush of the cat-a-tat she shared with Great Pretender.  For me, she, more than any other, was the cat that reinforced all the animal observation skills we had been taught as new volunteers.  Since I knew she was very old, I was always careful to check her respiration and paid close attention to her eating habits.  I was so surprised when, for a couple of days, I came upon her drinking from her water dish out in the open for the longest time.  Little did I know that the end was near for her and those moments watching her would soon be gone. I was there the day she died and it was sad to see such a majestic creature pass through my life.  As Grizabella’s song ‘Memory’ says, ‘Let the memory live again.’  Elsa’s memory will always be in my heart…..Julie, Senior Volunteer Keeper

More Memorials at http://bigcatrescue.org/category/memorials/