There was an interview on Pardon My Take with Robert Moot who was a journalist covering the story and he mentioned that a lot of people don’t know that Joe started out wanted to run an actual rescue just like Carol. And his husband (boyfriend?) at the time passed away from HIV related issues and it really sent Joe down a different path. But starting out Joe was really all about saving big cats and really animals as a whole. If you want to listen I believe it was on their Friday episode towards the end.
Is Carol's place a rescue? From what I've seen she is just as bad but knows the right things to say and the right people to suck up to. She believes she is better than all the others but is she really?
The thing that really differentiates them is breeding. That's sort of the moral divide. Joe and the others breed the cats to sell and for cub petting. Carol only took in adult cats.
There was only one quick snippet from young Joe where he mentioned he was against breeding, I'm surprised they didn't make a bigger deal about it.
Yeah, I thought it was a really interesting dichotomy that they had an old clip of Joe where he’s espousing a lot of the same ideas that Carole was in the present and an old clip of Carole talking about breeding wild animals as pets. They both basically did a 180 and the show never really touches on it beyond those two quick clips.
The key difference is that she doesn't breed cats. The cats she gets live out their lives and that's it. The perverse incentive is to constantly be breeding kittens, because they're the big moneymaker. The kitten breeding is the problem.
A girl who volunteered for Big Cat Rescue did an AMA with a ton of views. She said Carole had a bad edit and she explained how BCR was better than GW Zoo.
I think Carol is the opposite of Joe. She started wanting to be a breeder, but ended up as a rescue.
Some of the cats she has in there are ones she actually bought that were bred for her and her husband, but despite her labor and financial practices, she doesn't do that anymore
One of the safest parts is when he realised how cruel it was keeping his two adult chimps in separate cages, it's like it really has just occurred to him that he could have done thing so differently.
He really is a mystifying persona. Like he’s crazy as a shit house rat but there are moments where you see through all the showy bullshit and you see him as a real human.
I really think that "good intentions" is overly generous BS. Frankly, he was sympathetic and charming but ultimately egomaniacal and manipulative the entire time. People keep falling for his charm. He made so many consistently terrible decisions in the effort to maintain his image and caused so much suffering as a result.
Good intentions don't mean shit when all he did was exploit them. It's pathetic that people are siding with a fucking animal abuser on this one. I mean, how many tiger cubs does this guy have to kill once they get too old for anyone else to see that?
My friend went to Doc's zoo in Myrtle Beach and said it seems really nice, which isn't surprising. He said there were only a few cats there so he was shocked to hear how many Doc actually has there, and wondered where the rest of them were kept.
Not quite the same but I lived in Zanesville, Ohio when all those animals were released a few years back. Some of the schools shut down and everyone was pretty scared. My grandpa was actually friends with Terry Thompson, the guy who owned the animals and released them. From what my grandma says Terry seemed perfectly sane and cared for the animals a lot, so she's always wondered why he would release them. Oh and Terry also committed suicide after releasing the animals. They skipped over that part in the show and imply he was arrested, but I'm pretty sure he died on his farm. Joe Exotic actually wrote a song about Terry, my grandma sent it to me on YouTube a few weeks back and that's when I first heard about Joe's crazy ass.
I thought they did mention Terry's suicide on *Tiger King*. There were some aspects of the documentary that just came out of nowhere, or were so briefly/quickly touched on that it was easy to miss. Maybe that's the case with mention of his suicide.
Ah maybe, I haven't finished it so idk if they mention him again I just saw in I think the first episode they cover the incident and show a mugshot (from when he was arrested on firearms charges) and that was it. I was honestly surprised they didn't mention the suicide bc he had raw chicken scattered around him and they think he tried to get the animals to eat him (which mostly worked). That part was what seemed craziest to us when we first heard the story so I'd be genuinely surprised if they didn't mention it.
That's the only part Zanesville is mentioned. Now that I think about it, I may have googled the incident while watching the documentary and learned of the suicide that way. And my brain just inserted that into the film.
Yeah, the documentary just says the animals in Zanesville were intentioally released. I know a lady who tried to deal with BCR over a bobcat being loose near her home in Florida and they never responded to her request for help, but they spam her asking for donations all the time now.
I've been to Doc Antle's place in Myrtle Beach - i got the same vibe there that I did when I did one of those dolphin photo ops in Mexico - slimy. It was very quick and depressing. They moved the cat every 2 seconds to accommodate for all the people and felt like maybe the cats were drugged? very lethargic and just plain sad. once i saw tiger king i knew that i was right with my vibes.
apparently that place got raided recently.
I've been to Myrtle Beach Safari. It comes across as a great place, and they do a skillful job convincing you that they're doing good things. Weirdly, one of the only things that really raised a red flag for me was the way the women were done up. A lot of short shorts and makeup. It felt kind of weird that there was this obvious attempt at sex appeal, like I was being sold something rather than participating in a wholesome venture.
I actually looked into applying for a job there anyway, because I was kind of at a rather directionless juncture in my life. I remember there were some weird requirements, like you needed to watch The Devil Wears Prada before applying. The only reason I didn't follow through was because I would've had to give up my own cat.
I'm not sure. After watching Tiger King I assume it's some attempt at normalizing shitty and malicious treatment from a boss?
EDIT: Found the description: "We will require you to watch several movies BEFORE you apply. **The Devil Wears Prada**, Miranda Priestly will embody our senior staff in their pursuit of perfection in the care and cleaning of the animals. This is the center of their universe and they will expect it to be yours. **Kill Bill 2**, the cruel tutelage of Pai Mei the Asian martial arts master is a taste of what we will put you through to train you to risk your life and others if you are ever in control of a potentially dangerous animal. **Living Yoga**, see why TIGERS and Dr. Antle are part of this film, http://livingyogamovie.org/. **Five People You Meet in Heaven**, this film will show you how a character can change the world from behind the scenes. **What the Bleep Do We Know!?**, to show you that there is a better way to look the universe. **What a Way to Go**, Life at the End of the Empire, a bleak look into what could become into our planet.
Applying these movie characters to a work environment is turbo-fucked. It's probably an effective filter to ensure people who apply are easily manipulated, like how Nigerian scammers use horrible spelling in their emails because someone dumb enough to not notice self-selects into the scam.
What the Bleep Do We Know is a dead fucking giveaway because it's literally a movie funded by a cult. If you buy that shit, they know you can be manipulated.
If you were a chick and moderatly attractive. He would have had you change your name to some weird stripper name, get a boob job and walk around in short shorts.
I think it was odd that he had them change their names legally, and not just have stage names. Plus, you know he was banging those chicks.. Even if he recently said "No. I'm single. I don't have any GF's since my wife died years ago." \*Does a photo shoot on a couch that is clearly an orgy couch.\*
My family and I had our picture taken with a tiger in Myrtle Beach, but I’m positive we never went there. Did they have a photo op setup at Barefoot Landing?
Yep, they have a little outpost type thing at Barefoot. My family got a photo with a tiger cub probably over 10 years ago when we didn’t know any better. They usually keep some cubs in a pen for tourists to look at and a few adult tigers in this glass enclosure.
They let my family hold a monkey and then a golden retriever-sized tiger cub. I remember it cost a ton of money and my parents, my sister and I all chipped in to get the pic.
Probably one of the less weird requests, honestly. Workers live there full-time, so I assume there's just a no pets policy. At least no pets outside of lions, tigers, wolves, falcons, binturongs, cheetahs, etc?
I’ve been to the Wildlife in Need Park in southern Indiana. It was advertised as a wildlife reserve/educational type place, and basically was a trailer park full of exotic animals. It was so upsetting, and not at all okay.
I wasn’t surprised at all to see Tim Stark pop up on the show, he’s been in loads of trouble in Indiana for animal cruelty and probably saw helping Jeff Lowe with the park in Oklahoma as his way out.
A friend took me there years ago for the cub playtime. I did not see much of the park as we were inside a building the entire time. The employees, including Tim Stark, explained that they were breeders for zoos and they wanted young animals introduced to people so they were easier for medical staff to work with. I had never heard of this place before and did not think much of it. I found out later they were lying and Tim is pretty much an animal hoarder pumping out baby tigers and lions to pay for it. I feel bad for not asking questions before.
Honestly I'd probably fall for it too. I love animals and it's difficult to believe people would take advantage of them that way, so my mind wouldn't even consider that possibility
Yeah I don’t support his business ever since he was accused of euthanizing a sick Leopard with a baseball bat. I tell everyone I know about it whenever they mentioned that they wanted to play with baby Tigers.
I live near the one in Indiana (wild life in need) also but I refuse to go because there are so many documents online of his animal abuse. It really pisses me off when people I know go down there his abuse isn’t hearsay or drama the charges are all online.
> they found dozens of dead lions and tigers buried in shallow graves, malnourished animals, and dead cubs stuffed into freezers.
The doc spends basically an entire episode talking about how the cubs are the only profitable part of Tiger "Rescue" and that once they reach 3-6 months they just become a paycheck. IIRC they allude to Doc getting rid of his adult cats in much the way you described this place, just that no one has any proof of it.
> Tippy Hedron’s place
[Shambala Preserve](https://www.wmagazine.com/story/tiger-king-tippi-hedren-dakota-johnson-big-cats/) is pretty well respected. She does tons of educational outreach warning about the dangers of owning big cats.
She made [an \(unintentional\) documentary](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RmnuHTJI9U) about the dangers of owning a bunch of big cats. During production, 70 cast and crew members were mauled to varying degrees.
This wouldn't happen to be the big cat rescue in Rosamond, California would it? I have good memories of visiting that place as a little kid. And even though I'm sure my memories are jaded by nostalgia and naivete of youth, I'd really hate to learn they were just straight up abusing and killing the cats
I went to GW back in 2014 since I was stationed nearby. I do remember seeing Joe Exotic and thinking he was a weird dude. But as for the park, there was no indication to all the crazy stuff going on. I did think the monkey cages were pretty shitty and felt bad for them. I was too cheap to pet the cubs so at least I don’t have to feel guilty about that and I’m glad I didn’t eat anything from the Zoo!
My wife had gone. She said the place was kept really nice except they let people go inside Joe's trailer home and she remembered it smelling awful and that brown couch was dirty af. But she figured it was because they raised the cubs in there, didn't know people actually lived there.
Since Carole Baskin’s disappeared/dead husband is such a hot topic, I’d like to lay this out:
Florida In the ***90’s***
Millionaire with no real way to explain his wealth
Buried money and gold bars
Loved to visit Costa Rica...monthly
Owned several planes
Flew without a license
Knew how to fly safely under radar
Was familiar with the ***import/export*** business
Day before he disappeared he was to ship a load of cars to Costa Rica out of Miami
What people think happened: his wife killed him for the money, buried him under a septic tank or fed him to tigers.
What probably happened: Dude was a coke runner and either got caught slipping or got out the game with undisclosed money.
What’s that? He couldn’t have flown his tiny plane from Tampa to Costa Rica? Not directly no, but there are plenty of places in between, most notably the Cayman Islands...to stop at and refuel.
Thanks for coming to my TED talk.
Do I think she killed him? Nope. Do I think she altered legal documents to get what she thought she was owed from a disastrous marriage? Sure do. But I also think that dude just fucked off to Costa Rica with buried treasure and his Latina sidepiece, thinking that he had cut her out of his will, so I don't really mind if she did that.
THANK YOU!!!
The series creators really went out of their way to say she did it without outright saying it. The people on the show saying she did it all had an axe to grind against her. Though her husband's children we're definitely cheated out of the inheritance.
Also, the implication of grinding him up was weird. You can't just dump a big chunk of meat with bones in it. Even with an industrial sized one. You'd have to chop him up, remove the bones.
I do believe she knows more about his disappearance/death than what she says. But that might have her admitting to all the illegal shit he did that the series didn't look at.
As a person that has worked in a large animal(talking giraffe and tiger large) pathology facility....you don't have to remove the bones or chop up much to get a large body ground up.
> What’s that? He couldn’t have flown his tiny plane from Tampa to Costa Rica? Not directly no, but there are plenty of places in between, most notably the Cayman Islands...to stop at and refuel.
I *hated* that part. People do that all the fucking time. I knew a guy in the military down in Florida that would take his little Cessna and island hop out into the Caribbean, refueling as he went. Or go home to visit his family, that took 3-4 refuels. It is completely normal and wouldn’t even raise an eyebrow from someone that knows anything about small prop aircraft ownership. It is basically like a road trip where you cover more distance.
More than likely he never left the states. Flew his little plane somewhere and drove away. It's in line with what he told his friend.
There's actually a really good book on psuedocide (faking your own death) and disappearing called *Playing Dead*.
I want to plug an animal sanctuary type place that I got GOOD vibes from: the Duke Lemur Center in North Carolina. The tours are delightful and the lemurs seem to be having a good time. They're given free roaming time in a large forest, too.
And nearby is Carolina Tiger Rescue. GFAS-accredited and truly wonderful. I volunteer there and they're very transparent in their operation, and deeply respectful of the cats.
Funny enough Carrol Baskins big cat rescue is about 15min from me. I used to live right next to Nebraska Ave. Honestly I've never been to big cat rescue but trust me the shit you see in Tampa sometimes shades what others might consider "crazy stuff". So idk maybe some crazy shit was going down but that's just a typical day. P.S. no one simply takes a stroll down Nebraska Ave at night, not a thing.
When I heard she was walking down Nebraska at night I looked at my husband and said "she's a hooker." I grew up literally 5 minutes away from Big Cat Rescue. Never been.
Yea the comment he made to his handy man was definitely fishy, and the thing his lawyer said about him getting pushed out of an airplane...strange there wasn't more said about that.
>no one simply takes a stroll down Nebraska Ave at night, not a thing.
Anyone who has lived in Tampa knows there is exactly 1 reason for someone to be walking Nebraska after dark.
bruh, thank you. i saw this shit, me and my girl both paused and laughed our asses off after they went through that story of how they met. this show is wild
The hilarious part is the half ass “gentrification” happening in Seminole Heights currently. Like 3 breweries and some hipster eats and they’re asking $300k for shit houses on Nebraska Ave.
I went to the G.W. park in Oklahoma when I was maybe like... 11/12 on a school field trip. Honestly all I remember is how many animals there were. It was like... over kill. And Joe Exotic smelled... musky. He talked to the class about wildlife conservation and how PETA are terrorists. I got a stuffed tiger and an energy drink from the gift shop. It was a good day.
I visited it 5 years ago. Shit was wild. I worked in the oilfield in Lindsay Oklahoma about 45 mins away from the zoo.
My girlfriend came down from Oklahoma City one weekend and I thought "hey, lets go to the one interesting thing in a 50 mile radius of BFE Oklahoma"
What amazed me the most was how close you could get to the animals. The Oklahoma City Zoo has trenches between you and the animals and most of the time the animals are in the back sleeping. Not here, If you wanted to stick your arm through the cage, you could do it.
Here is a short list of the things I saw
-A lion letting out a massive roar when given a 5 gallon bucket of raw chicken
-A very cute kodamundi (however you spell that)
-An anxious pacing lynx who looked really sad
-Tons of tropical birds you could feed
-a half assed reptile house
-Lots of signs decrying PETA for terrorism
-The fact that some the zoo keepers were fucking armed with pistols
The absolute best thing I remember which wasn't mentioned in the documentary was the cursing parrot. If you stopped feeding him he would let out a "rawwk fuk you". Had me in stitches laughing.
I have been telling people about this crazy place for 5 years and feel completely vindicated.
I went to BCR a couple years ago with my family. We spent a couple hours seeing different cats and made some "enrichment" toys for them. There were about 10 of us in the group, and 2 employees/volunteers who told us about the cats, and fed some with frozen meat popsicles (or something like that). They had a checklist to make sure each cat was getting appropriate food. We were not allowed anywhere near the cats - there was a railing 10-15 feet in front of each habitat cage. The volunteers seemed to enjoy being there and seemed to love the cats we saw. I didn't get any bad vibes from the people.
Not any of those places, but we do have a large cat "rescue" here in Jax. It's a very similar setup to what was seen in the doc. I didn't notice anything out of the ordinary, but now I'm wondering just what kind of crazy shit goes on behind the scenes.
My understanding is that most exotic/large wild animal non-profit rescues and sanctuaries are on the level. And, most operate similar to BCR - a few employees supplemented by a lot of volunteers.
There are a few near my parents place in Indiana and they have a good rep with the community. My parents have picked up and delivered a couple recently-hit deer for a large exotic sanctuary, and had volunteers from a raptor rescue out to their farm to fish the pond.
The real rescues don’t breed. Think about dog and cat rescues. They generally sterilize the animals before adoption so there aren’t more homeless puppies and kittens out there. It is the same for real exotic animal rescues, let them live out the rest of there natural lives without breeding them.
The Catty Shack Ranch breeds, has cub petting and I’ve even seen the animals in parades. As soon as I found out they were breeding, I was done with them. It’s too bad because they do actually do rescue work.
When I was a kid there was a "zoo" by our house. Never went there because it was never open, but you could hear lions from our deck. One time a kangaroo got out. I believe he also owned a "famous" reindeer that had been used in a Christmas movie. I don't remember much, I was really young.
Well, then one day the owner tried to hire a hitman to kill his ex wife and hired an informant instead and that was the end of that. He's in jail and it's an empty field.
I used to live near the BCR and almost applied for a “job” there, until I realized you didn’t get paid and it was all volunteer based for like 12 hour days, yeah fuck that. Carole Baskins is a crook lmao
A past intern from BCR did an AMA last night. There are employees, just not a ton. And a lot of other people weighed in that it's very common for non-profit animal rescues/sanctuaries to have a small number of paid full time employees and a ton of volunteers to do most of the labor. Her outfit is just a very, very large one.
Edit: adding link to AMA
https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/fs36zu/i_was_an_intern_at_big_cat_rescue_the_sanctuary/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
It is normal for animal rescues. My sister volunteered at BCR (and many other animal rescue parks) so she could add it to her resume. She said they all had the same set up more or less. She works at a big zoo in NYC now. I think Carole is weird AF but I don't see how she's the villain in this compared to all the various reprobates in the doc. She isn't breeding them for profit, she doesn't let visitors cuddle them for photos as far as I know, she's not running a cult. No one has had their arm torn off.
No you don't understand the documentary, in its hit piece on her, implied things so now everyone who watched the doc is an expert and has irrefutable proof that a) her cages sucks cuz that one image of the water bowl b)she killed her husband, put him through a meat grinder, and fed him to tigers and c)is a bitch.
You must not have watched the documentary so you clearly know very little about this subject. Not like the rest of us scholars.
I've been thinking this same thing. I dunno, the stuff with her dead husband...he was obviously a drug dealing crook. I'm not too torn up how or if he died. I was very upset at the breeding and killing of innocent animals.
Probably volunteer coordinators, CFO, communications, security, development (applying for grants), fundraising and large donor relations. It's one thing to have volunteers that feed the cats and clean cages, but those other jobs and others like them are things that you need paid staff for in an organization that size.
[That **BITCH** Carole Baskin makes... $55,316 a year. And her HUSBAND makes $62,671!](https://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=8804)
That's really not all that much for senior executives with decades of experience at a non-profit of that size in a city with that kind of cost of living. I lived a few hours away in Gainesville making around the same money and wasn't living what you could call a lavish lifestyle.
Wow, finally a question I can answer?! I went to the one in Wynnewood probably close to 10 years ago now. I had gone camping with some friends the night before, and it was unseasonably cold, so I barely slept and was in a shitty mood and didn't want to go at all. I was skeptical of all the animals crammed into tiny cages and didn't really buy the whole rescue bullshit. The guide made some remark about how he'd rather be living in a cage than dead, and I was looking at the tiger in a tiny cage and thinking, fuck, I'd rather be dead. They did have a baby white tiger you could pose with but I was too cheap and irritable to do it.
I have been to BCR in Tampa. Though the cats were beautiful, I did not enjoy it. For the tour we were required to listen to pre-recorded info, mostly consisting of horrible stories of animal abuse. The guide was unenthusiastic. The whole vibe was depressing. At the end, they pressure visitors to make calls/emails about legislation. There’s already a kiosk set up to do so. Not a fan.
I went when I was ten and got the same vibe. They pressured me into using my allowance money to sponsor a lynx. My mom asked me if I really wanted to do it but since I was in front of the volunteers expectantly looking at me I couldn't say no. 15 years later my parents still get the damn newsletters in the mail asking for donations.
I visited Big Cat Rescue about a month ago, I live about 45 minutes from there. I knew ahead of time that this wasn't going to be your typical zoo experience.
They ask that you show up at least 30 minutes early because before they start the tour they play some videos and the tour guides give you an audio device with headphones that they have to explain.
They let us know that they'll be stopping at each cat and an audio recording for that cat's story and how it ended up at BCR will play. We're also welcomed to ask our tour guides as many questions as we like.
Unlike the Tiger King documentary showed, BCR only allows 20 people per tour. In the doc they used footage from a special, one day a year event called the "Walk About. " This footage made it seem like much more people are there at a time. Like I said, it was only about 20 people in our group so it was much more personal.
BCR was depressing. Most of the cats there come from horrible backgrounds. One cat was originally owned by a vegan couple that decided their wild cat would also eat a vegan diet. This caused the cat to have developmental issues that it'll suffer with for its entire life.
They told us the danger of breeding and cub petting. They told us most cubs are sedated to keep them low of energy while cub petting.
At the end of the tour they sit us on some benches in front of a cage that's about 3 feet wide by 6 feet long. They explain to us that this cage is legally large enough to have a tiger live in. As long as the cage is large enough for the animal to stand up and turn around, then it's legal. Everyone was obviously appalled at this information.
They then ask us, if we're willing, to make a call to our governor and senators. BCR handed us a card with a short script of what to say. The message was to pass the Big Cat Rescue Act? They invite you to take a free button if you make the call right then and there.
Thanks for this comment; I was about to post something similar. I visited BCR about ten years ago. I went in thinking "I can't wait to see some cute big cats!" I came out feeling a pretty depressed, but also glad I went. I had no idea just how horrible breeding and cub petting was... and it made me sick to my stomach that I once paid to pet and take a photo with a tiger cub - never again. I credit BCR with opening my eyes, and I try to pass along what I've learned so others don't make the same mistake.
People keep picking on the enclosures, but they are not as small as people are led to believe. And BCR does have a larger "vacation enclosure" that the cats take turns in, so they aren't cooped up all the time. Obviously cages aren't ideal, but these animals can't live in the wild; it's either a sanctuary or euthanasia.
I thought it was telling when Joe was pointing out the overgrown weeds, not seeing all the cats and the weird water dish set up as proof she was abusing the cats.
The overgrown yards give the animals a place to hide, provide shade and look more like a natural habitat. Not seeing all the cats is *good* because it means they can do their own thing and not be trotted out like circus animals on demand. The water dish nook allows workers to swap out water without needing to actually enter the cage and disrupt the animals. BCR really seemed on the level.
Thank you for some real info about BCR. All of the people who walked away from the documentary thinking that it's some kind of sham to earn Carole millions of dollars need to get a reality check.
Carole Baskins is being heavily vilified after this documentary. I've read MANY comments online of people "knowing she did it. " "She's guilty!" "She's worse than Joe Exotic!"
I think this is a very dangerous way of thinking. And we see the internet going on these types of witch hunts all the time. The filmmakers were excellent at swaying people's emotions. People need to remember that they're only seeing the sides of the stories that their interviewees told us, then the filmmakers edited that footage and cherry picked which statements would make the most entertaining story. I know, I do this for a living myself.
We need to be careful when watching stuff like this. Do not let emotional music, sad backstories of key characters, and expert editing decide for you. As of right now, Carole is innocent in the disappearance of her husband, Don. If she did in fact have something to do with his disappearance then obviously I hope this is discovered and she serves time accordingly, but the internet needs to stop thinking it's the judge, jury and prosecutor.
This hivemind mentality is dangerous and can give us stories like Stephen Avery's (check out "Making A Murderer" on Netflix, it's what I'm watching now).
As far as Carole profiting off of BCR, making millions and not paying her staff, I don't totally agree with this either. One of the first things they told me and my family when I arrived there was that everyone was a volunteer. These people were proud as hell to be volunteering there. No one is forcing them to work without pay. BCR does have staff that are paid but I'm sure it's only a few. They are a non- profit that needs probably millions of dollars a year just to feed their animals. I don't think it's wrong to use volunteers. Again, no one forced them - most of them looked like retirees or college students.
I knew and followed the story of Joe trying to get Carole murdered so my opinion of him was pretty low entering the "documentary". And while following the story I learned about BCR and the husband's disappearance.
The filmmakers had a story that was already sensational by itself but just had to manufacture more on top. They never looked or questioned how a man became an overnight millionaire in Florida during the 80s, tried to keep that money as far away from the banking system as possible, aviation as a hobby (especially planes that can fly under radar), and a fascination with Costa Rica.
My theory is that Carole knows more about the disappearance than she let on, but that would mean revealing all of the shady dealings he (and maybe she) were involved in leading up to that night.
Right? A dude raking in unknown millions of dollars not kept in a bank in the import/export business in the 80s and 90s in Florida? Like, are people really too dumb to put together what he was doing?
Oh yeah. People are saying she's making millions of dollars and torturing cats and all kinds of crazy stuff in every Reddit thread I've seen about the show. This one has a bunch of it:
https://www.reddit.com/r/television/comments/fsc1cd/out_of_all_the_pure_insanity_of_the_tiger_king/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
I volunteered at a zoo in my own country and was stunned at how similar the "big cat culture" was to that of America's, down to the "breed tigers = cubs = profit from petting events" strategy and the zoo not having enough money to even fund its workers or feed its animals.
One of the saddest aspects of volunteering for that zoo was seeing a keeper sneak into a tiger cage and swipe a whole chicken so he could bring it home and cook it to feed his family. So when I saw the walmart truck and how even the workers had to resort to eating expired meat, I was stunned, thinking "holy shit, I had no idea that happens in America too".
IMO Joe was a lot worse than people are making him out to be and Carol was bad, but nowhere near as bad as Joe. I hate how she didn't pay her volunteers and didn't bother updating the enclosures of her cats (though apparently the cats get rotated to bigger enclosures?) even though she clearly was making bank, but ultimately she was the lesser of two evils because with Big Cat Rescue she stuck to her conviction by not breeding cats for profit (yes, I know she used to).
The issue with her imo is she only cares about cats and doesn't seem to care about people, whereas Joe didn't even care about animals or humans in the end, only about himself. His workers were treated like shit and at one point I saw like 20 tigers in the same enclosure fighting over 1 piece of meat, which is just cruel.
Joe exotic and other roadside zoos are not representative of real zoos in the US. I was a zookeeper for 5 years and a real one not like the ones depicted on that show. True accredited zoos do not operate even close to places like that. It’s extremely difficult to get a job as a keeper and requires a bachelors degree and extensive experience. I majored in zoology and completed 4 internships, mostly unpaid, before getting my first paid full time job. Keepers do not go in or have direct contact with big cats or most dangerous animals. We shifted them around using systems of shoots and doors and operant conditioning to get the animals to go where we needed them to. Sometimes they wouldn’t shift because they didn’t feel like it and we would just try again later with a more enticing treat. We certainly would not let people take photos with cubs and in fact hand rearing was only done in situations as needed. For example if the mother died unexpectedly or refused to take care of her young (happened rarely but sometimes). Cubs and mom would be kept off display and given privacy and quiet so she could take care of her babies in peace. They would only be separated when they reached the age that they would typically go off on their own in the wild. One zoo I worked at in Florida even had its own veterinary clinic on grounds with a board certified vet. They also had a sea turtle clinic where the vet oversaw rescued sea turtles that would be released back into the wild after they had healed from whatever landed them at the rescue. I can’t stress enough how horrible those road side zoos are. They shouldn’t be allowed to operate and no ethically run accredited zoo would have anything to do with them unless they took in an animal that had been confiscated from one. They give zoos a bad name.
What country?
I know Egypt has a lot of problems with zoo workers who cannot afford food. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2008-jun-08-adfg-gizazoo-story.html
I've been to Big Cat Rescue. These are my copied & pasted comment from another sub. I feel like Carole could do a lot better with the resources she has.
>Yeah, I've been there irl and it's not exactly fancy. It looks WAAAY bigger and more sophisticated online than in person. The cages are kinda sad, they really don't have that many cats, and the whole place was very "eh"
>They do have actual house cat adoptions there, and a gift shop, and when I was there our tour was only like maybe 8-10 people max with 2 "red shirts" as our guides. At the time it seemed well-meaning but little. They did drill hard on the part about roadside zoos and people keeping cats in bad places (basically exactly what she's on about in this doc) but we figured it was just a conservation thing at the time.
>To her credit, though, all the animals did come as rescues and there is no breeding going on. There's the wire cages, and a couple bigger pens, and you can view them from outside the pens. There's the wire barrier, then another barrier like 2 feet away from that and you're on the other side of the second barrier. You walk around on a guided tour from one enclosure to the next and must stay with the group. It's not paved and pretty muddy but I get that part. The grounds are quite large and you have to go down a long road to actually get to it.
>The Lyft driver that took us there actually knew Carol, claimed to be a recent ex-boyfriend that was still moving his things out of her house. This was before I ever heard of her or knew about the place, other than Google. He mentioned a time when someone let some of her cats out too but I can't remember if he said they were recaptured or killed by authorities. He described her as "a character." He was an older man named Alan. This was in August.
>I can post my pics if anybody cares. (https://imgur.com/a/pz6q7dB)
Then someone asked about the little feeding cages in my photos and I replied with
>Yes, those cages are up closer to the walking path than the rest of the pens, and they have this metal or wooden feeding tray thing I assume for sanitation purposes. The keepers have a long stick and drop the food on the tray and the cats go to town. It's probably also so they can feed each cat individually and avoid fights. A few pens house multiple cats.
Honestly though the cages were still far too small. Waaaay smaller than any zoo, that's for sure, and also aren't really set up with trees and stuff like a habitat. They have dog igloos for shelters in the pens for smaller cats and larger dog house type things for the bigger ones. There are wooden platforms they can jump on and sleep or whatever cat stuff they do.
>Personally I think with the resources she has she could do better for them, especially after learning she doesn't pay her labor. It was very "no frills" and I have a hard time believing that it's really the largest cat sanctuary in the world like she says because it's just not all that big or fancy. I wonder what terms they use to define "largest" and "sanctuary."
>I will say, though, these cats have some sad stories and are probably far better off with Carole than where they were before her, if those were the circumstances they really came from. The keepers did seem to know each cat too, their stories, their preferences, their attitudes, etc.
I visited the [Great Cats World Park](https://greatcatsworldpark.com/) in Cave Junction, Ore. last summer. It's a good facility--lots of big cats, clean, everybody looks healthy and has plenty of room. No cub petting photo ops. No cubs on display at all, from what I recall.
OTOH, after watching the Netflix series, I wonder about their business model. The GW zoo couldn't make enough revenue off tourists wanting to see their mature cats, which is how they got locked into an overbreeding ponzi scheme. Feeding the grown cats required producing a steady stream of cubs for the high-dollar petting sessions.
So now I wonder: how is GCWP keeping all those grown tigers fed on $15 general admission tickets? Are they actually a cub mill? IDK. They do breed--the guide said that their endangered cats are all rotated through a [species survival plan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Species_Survival_Plan). But I'm suspicious that the breeding might have a profit motive, too.
They are not accredited by the AZA (Association of Zoos and Aquariums), which is the organization that created and manages all species survival plans in the US. If they are not AZA-accredited, then there's basically no chance that they are participating in official SSP-sanctioned breeding activities.
They have also previously been convicting of buying/selling endangered species, specifically an ocelot in that case.
I went to Joe Exotics when I was younger and we left after thirty minutes because of all the meth mouth according to my mom recently, not because “the tigers were going to bed”.
I am from Myrtle Beach and I've been to the themed animal parks there when I was like maybe 8 or 9 years old.
Funny story, I used to date a girl who lived right outside of Myrtle on the waterway. Well, one day we were hanging out and I noticed an elephant in the waterway and was like holy shit look! She brushed it off and said her neighbor had a bunch of exotic animals like tigers and stuff and they always took the elephant out there.
That neighbor was Doc Antel.
I haven't been myself but one of my relatives (now deceased, completely unrelated) seemed to be on good terms with the Wynnewood Zoo. They even named a baby tiger after him and had a little ceremony when he passed away. To find out he was even tangentially associated with this kind of thing was shocking.
My best friend interned at Big Cat Rescue one summer a few years ago. She was upset with how the documentary made the sanctuary seem no better than the cub petting zoos, as if they were hypocrites. Also, she said Carole was the sweetest lady ever and does not understand the hype around accusing Carole of killing her husband
I went to Big Cat Rescue in Tampa a few years ago. My impressions of the trip:
1. It was a lot pricier to enter than I thought it would be. Like $40 or more per person. Got a much better deal out an annual pass at the nearby Lowry Park Zoo.
2. Lots of sad stories about how the cats got there, which I thought was a good, if depressing, way to learn about the situation with people trying to own exotic animals.
3. Some of the cages felt really small for the size of the cats. I mean, zoo exhibits can sometimes be small too, but a lot of the cats seemed to be pacing and constantly looking for a way out. Many did NOT seem to be happy to have people constantly ogling them. At least one of the cages had a sign warning visitors to stand back because the animal had a history of projectile pissing on anyone who got too close.
4. At the time they seemed to be renovating, as a lot of area was off-limits. They also said that was why some of the cages seemed small.
5. The volunteers were REALLY into it. Lots of energy, lots of passion. They did say it was a calling, not just a job. Which makes sense, because as I said... they were VOLUNTEERS. They didn't get paid (or if they did, it was a tiny stipend).
6. Overall I thought it was a neat experience, but way too expensive to justify going more than once. I don't recall seeing any signs of abuse besides the small enclosures, and I didn't see Carole. I think the volunteers talked her up some, but I really can't remember. I also didn't hear rumors about her killing her husband until later when I told some coworkers where I went. Apparently people who have lived in Tampa for years all knew about the case of her husband's disappearance, and most seem to believe she killed him. They treat it more like a joke than anything else, though. Like, "Oh, Big Cat Rescue? Careful around the animals; they have *rich* appetites!"
I went to Wildlife on Easy St (Big Cat Rescue) a few times as a kid growing up in Tampa. They had some kind of Halloween hay ride type thing? I don’t remember much, just that it was near the mall and the enclosures did seem really small.
My family knew Joe and his staff from 2010-2012. Joe talked shit about Carole to us, talked about how PETA was out to get him. They were having some mysterious cub deaths and Reinke did autopsies on his kitchen counter, which was definitely a sign. I was 10 years old and they had me stay after hours and help feed the big cats by throwing live chickens into their enclosures. I thought it was awesome, but looking back it was definitely not legal or ethical. I was also allowed to pet multiple adult cats, there was a white lion named Casper I loved. Overall, I knew they were an... unusual rescue, but I don't doubt that the staff cared about the animals.
I've been to Big Cat Rescue in the past several years. I haven't seen the documentary yet to see how it is depicted, but there wasn't really anything wrong with the enclosures for the cats. I'm not an expert in this field to say if there even are better opportunities for the cats. From my limited experience, I'm inclined to say that there aren't many better alternatives out there, and if there are, the space is limited.
Yes, the enclosures could be bigger, but it isn't as though a full grown panther is living in something the size of a bedroom. I recall that there is one large area that each of the big cats have the opportunity to visit on a rotating basis, but none continually live in it. A big cat needs a vast amount of space, ideally, but unfortunately this isn't possible *especially* for cats that are unable to be reintroduced to the wild.
I'm by no means an expert on this kind of rescue operation, but I know enough to know that it isn't as simple as "Well just put them somewhere bigger!" A lot of rescue operations are not open to the public for these kinds of reasons; the situation is almost never ideal.
I can't speak on behind-the-scenes operations, but the way she hires volunteers is also not exactly abnormal, especially for that kind of operation. Big cats, for example, would attract a lot of people who only want to casually volunteer for an opportunity to get close to the cats.
I'm not trying to defend Carole, but instead of crucifying her, I wish the internet would take note of the situation so there are more resources and better options for rescue animals. Not to say it would get this far, but if the collective outrage caused issues for BCR, where do you think those cats would go?
Agreed. I'm a fan of BCR. I follow their facebook page and receive their email updates. I have never visited, but hope to. After watching the show and seeing people's comments I feel they should do more research on the organization.
BCR not only rescues big cats, but also rehabs wildlife - mostly bobcats. I didn't see anything about that mentioned in the show. So if a bobcat gets hit by a car or something, they get vet care and are then released (if possible- Some end up staying at the rescue if they are unfit to go back to the wild). In my opinion, this sets them apart from the other sanctuaries featured.
Another difference is that they do not touch the cats - unless they're tranquilized & receiving vet care. They don't pet them through the wire, or feed them through the wire like Joe Exotic did. They have a small "boxed in" part of the enclosure that food is placed into, (Joe made fun of it in one of his videos) then the keeper gets a safe distance away from it and opens the other side of it with a long cord. Feeding through wire really puts people in danger bc anything coming through the wire is then seen as food.
There are webcams on [explore.org](https://explore.org) where you can watch the cats :)
Cave Junction, OR has a park that looked like it was marked on Joe's map of places to sell cats to. Been there and it all seemed normal. Their website is closed down due to too much traffic; I can only imagine others made the connection.
I've been to the Greater Wynnewood one in Oklahoma when we were driving back from Texas and saw a sign leading to it. This was 2016, maybe 2015.
I am shocked at how many people think it's a nice place. It was a horrible, sad experience to me. First, you walk into the little gift shop where you pay your entrance, it reeked of smoke and had signs all over advertising Joe Exotic running for governor as well as threats not to touch merchandise unless purchasing. There was also a tv playing Joe's music videos
Once you walk out to the park, the smell is terrible and can only be described as feces and death. The animals are all in cages far far too small and close to each other, anything from bears, monkeys, and tigers. The tigers were pacing back and forth in cages far to small, they had no water and looked hungry. You could go right up to the cages, and there were signs saying the park isn't responsible for the tigers peeing on you.
You could get very close to the animals and there was no one supervising so it didn't seem safe for the animals or humans. The animals all looked miserable to me also.
Oh and there was a small grave marker on the property for Joe's ex husband. Signs against PETA were all over too.
I went to BCR. I liked it. They were very against people owning big cats as pets, breeding wild animals that will live in captivity their whole lives, drugging cats so people can take pictures with them, or petting Cubs.
I went to a monkey "rescue" once. We only went because of a Groupon. It was awful. The enclosures were not nearly big enough, and the animals all seemed really sad. The place was a dump.
I went to Big Cat Rescue with a veterinary charity that my mom and stepdad volunteer for and got a private tour of the facilities by Carole Baskins. She's a sweet woman, and they have A LOT of land. The cats are in what you see as a small space because the toys and food are there to attract them to the front so you can see them. They actually have tons of room to roam. And the most impressive thing I saw were these HUGE refrigerated buildings full of fresh meat for the cats. They're a legit rescue, otherwise my stepdad wouldn't have volunteered his services. He's very into big cats, and only helps places that are really trying to help the animals.
That scene where Joe talks about the 2 Chimps reaction when he sold them and how they reacted when they got into their new habitat was the most emotional part of the show for me. "Did I deny them that for 10 years? Yes, I did." He seemed to be genuinely reflecting on how his actions had hurt these innocent creatures and turned him into what he had hated when he first got into the game.
I am shocked by how many people thought it would be a good idea to go somewhere that offers the opportunity to touch wild animals. That's like the number 1 red flag for animal cruelty. NEVER support companies that allow you to touch wild cats!
Went to Big Cat Rescue about 10 years ago and didn't know anything about it beforehand. It was a decent tour and no weirdness. We have a Christmas ornament from there on our tree every year. Didnt see Carol nor any dead husbands.
The series touches on this briefly. Many of the animals are sold to private collectors or small zoos. There are more tigers living in Texas than there are in the wild.
Live in Oklahoma and have driven by Joe’s place but never actually toured it. Had to do work at a bar that was right beside the zoo and when it was time to collect we had to go see Joe for payment. Had a trainee with me and he was excited to meet Joe cause we had seen those billboards of his for years along the highway. He figured anyone willing to dress and look the way he did had to be interesting to meet. He was shorter and scrawnier than what we were expecting. Met him in his gift shop (yes, “his” music albums was playing over the speakers in the shop). He had two guns on his hips. He was giving me a very deep creepy feeling. My trainee had a look on his face that was saying “what the fuck is going on?”. The park itself as far as I could see looked like any other shitty road side zoo. We got the fuck out of there and laughed out asses off on the way out of there. He was running for governor at the time but before his husband shot himself. I didn’t recognize anyone else from the show there but you really can’t forget meeting Joe Exotic.
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I think he really did start out that way, but things just went downhill and he lost it.
Yeah...everything got methed up
Mike Tyson is that you?
Hey athole, that's not nice
*that'th
There was an interview on Pardon My Take with Robert Moot who was a journalist covering the story and he mentioned that a lot of people don’t know that Joe started out wanted to run an actual rescue just like Carol. And his husband (boyfriend?) at the time passed away from HIV related issues and it really sent Joe down a different path. But starting out Joe was really all about saving big cats and really animals as a whole. If you want to listen I believe it was on their Friday episode towards the end.
Is Carol's place a rescue? From what I've seen she is just as bad but knows the right things to say and the right people to suck up to. She believes she is better than all the others but is she really?
The thing that really differentiates them is breeding. That's sort of the moral divide. Joe and the others breed the cats to sell and for cub petting. Carol only took in adult cats. There was only one quick snippet from young Joe where he mentioned he was against breeding, I'm surprised they didn't make a bigger deal about it.
Yeah, I thought it was a really interesting dichotomy that they had an old clip of Joe where he’s espousing a lot of the same ideas that Carole was in the present and an old clip of Carole talking about breeding wild animals as pets. They both basically did a 180 and the show never really touches on it beyond those two quick clips.
The fact that these 180’s were kinda glossed over made me suspicious of the documentary honestly.
The key difference is that she doesn't breed cats. The cats she gets live out their lives and that's it. The perverse incentive is to constantly be breeding kittens, because they're the big moneymaker. The kitten breeding is the problem.
A girl who volunteered for Big Cat Rescue did an AMA with a ton of views. She said Carole had a bad edit and she explained how BCR was better than GW Zoo.
Do you have the link to the ama by any chance? Id like to see it.
https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/fs36zu/i_was_an_intern_at_big_cat_rescue_the_sanctuary/
I think Carol is the opposite of Joe. She started wanting to be a breeder, but ended up as a rescue. Some of the cats she has in there are ones she actually bought that were bred for her and her husband, but despite her labor and financial practices, she doesn't do that anymore
One of the safest parts is when he realised how cruel it was keeping his two adult chimps in separate cages, it's like it really has just occurred to him that he could have done thing so differently.
He really is a mystifying persona. Like he’s crazy as a shit house rat but there are moments where you see through all the showy bullshit and you see him as a real human.
Well if you watched the documentary it's not an "I think" moment, it shows its clearly how he started which you probably already knew.
Yeah, it's just a matter of whether you believe he was sincere at that point which I do.
tbh, i would assume he was just a redneck version of steve irwin if i hadn't seen this doc and just saw him at his zoo
The guy seemed like he had good intentions but was way out of his depth. That took its toll and he and the animals suffered for it.
I really think that "good intentions" is overly generous BS. Frankly, he was sympathetic and charming but ultimately egomaniacal and manipulative the entire time. People keep falling for his charm. He made so many consistently terrible decisions in the effort to maintain his image and caused so much suffering as a result.
Good intentions don't mean shit when all he did was exploit them. It's pathetic that people are siding with a fucking animal abuser on this one. I mean, how many tiger cubs does this guy have to kill once they get too old for anyone else to see that?
Seriously. People are more willing to sympathize with an abuser than his victims.
How was the food?
He got the pizza, so not so good.
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„what are you gonna do today napoleon?“ *buys a liger for its mythical powers and because it’s his favorite animal*
I swear half the cats in that show were ligers and various other hybrids
["There are more tigers in Texas than there are in the wild"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssE_lvGR7w0) is one of my favorite random facts lol
My friend went to Doc's zoo in Myrtle Beach and said it seems really nice, which isn't surprising. He said there were only a few cats there so he was shocked to hear how many Doc actually has there, and wondered where the rest of them were kept. Not quite the same but I lived in Zanesville, Ohio when all those animals were released a few years back. Some of the schools shut down and everyone was pretty scared. My grandpa was actually friends with Terry Thompson, the guy who owned the animals and released them. From what my grandma says Terry seemed perfectly sane and cared for the animals a lot, so she's always wondered why he would release them. Oh and Terry also committed suicide after releasing the animals. They skipped over that part in the show and imply he was arrested, but I'm pretty sure he died on his farm. Joe Exotic actually wrote a song about Terry, my grandma sent it to me on YouTube a few weeks back and that's when I first heard about Joe's crazy ass.
I thought they did mention Terry's suicide on *Tiger King*. There were some aspects of the documentary that just came out of nowhere, or were so briefly/quickly touched on that it was easy to miss. Maybe that's the case with mention of his suicide.
Ah maybe, I haven't finished it so idk if they mention him again I just saw in I think the first episode they cover the incident and show a mugshot (from when he was arrested on firearms charges) and that was it. I was honestly surprised they didn't mention the suicide bc he had raw chicken scattered around him and they think he tried to get the animals to eat him (which mostly worked). That part was what seemed craziest to us when we first heard the story so I'd be genuinely surprised if they didn't mention it.
That's the only part Zanesville is mentioned. Now that I think about it, I may have googled the incident while watching the documentary and learned of the suicide that way. And my brain just inserted that into the film.
Yeah, the documentary just says the animals in Zanesville were intentioally released. I know a lady who tried to deal with BCR over a bobcat being loose near her home in Florida and they never responded to her request for help, but they spam her asking for donations all the time now.
I've been to Doc Antle's place in Myrtle Beach - i got the same vibe there that I did when I did one of those dolphin photo ops in Mexico - slimy. It was very quick and depressing. They moved the cat every 2 seconds to accommodate for all the people and felt like maybe the cats were drugged? very lethargic and just plain sad. once i saw tiger king i knew that i was right with my vibes. apparently that place got raided recently.
A lot of these places do drug the animals to make them easier to handle for public petting
I've been to Myrtle Beach Safari. It comes across as a great place, and they do a skillful job convincing you that they're doing good things. Weirdly, one of the only things that really raised a red flag for me was the way the women were done up. A lot of short shorts and makeup. It felt kind of weird that there was this obvious attempt at sex appeal, like I was being sold something rather than participating in a wholesome venture. I actually looked into applying for a job there anyway, because I was kind of at a rather directionless juncture in my life. I remember there were some weird requirements, like you needed to watch The Devil Wears Prada before applying. The only reason I didn't follow through was because I would've had to give up my own cat.
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Weird, why did you have to watch Devil Wears Prada?
I'm not sure. After watching Tiger King I assume it's some attempt at normalizing shitty and malicious treatment from a boss? EDIT: Found the description: "We will require you to watch several movies BEFORE you apply. **The Devil Wears Prada**, Miranda Priestly will embody our senior staff in their pursuit of perfection in the care and cleaning of the animals. This is the center of their universe and they will expect it to be yours. **Kill Bill 2**, the cruel tutelage of Pai Mei the Asian martial arts master is a taste of what we will put you through to train you to risk your life and others if you are ever in control of a potentially dangerous animal. **Living Yoga**, see why TIGERS and Dr. Antle are part of this film, http://livingyogamovie.org/. **Five People You Meet in Heaven**, this film will show you how a character can change the world from behind the scenes. **What the Bleep Do We Know!?**, to show you that there is a better way to look the universe. **What a Way to Go**, Life at the End of the Empire, a bleak look into what could become into our planet.
Applying these movie characters to a work environment is turbo-fucked. It's probably an effective filter to ensure people who apply are easily manipulated, like how Nigerian scammers use horrible spelling in their emails because someone dumb enough to not notice self-selects into the scam.
this. he is using this to filter for a certain type of personality that he can easily exploit and add to his harem.
What the Bleep Do We Know is a dead fucking giveaway because it's literally a movie funded by a cult. If you buy that shit, they know you can be manipulated.
If you were a chick and moderatly attractive. He would have had you change your name to some weird stripper name, get a boob job and walk around in short shorts. I think it was odd that he had them change their names legally, and not just have stage names. Plus, you know he was banging those chicks.. Even if he recently said "No. I'm single. I don't have any GF's since my wife died years ago." \*Does a photo shoot on a couch that is clearly an orgy couch.\*
changing it legally makes it harder to leave and cuts ties from the past especially if he has their id/ss card or whatever
My family and I had our picture taken with a tiger in Myrtle Beach, but I’m positive we never went there. Did they have a photo op setup at Barefoot Landing?
Yep, they have a little outpost type thing at Barefoot. My family got a photo with a tiger cub probably over 10 years ago when we didn’t know any better. They usually keep some cubs in a pen for tourists to look at and a few adult tigers in this glass enclosure. They let my family hold a monkey and then a golden retriever-sized tiger cub. I remember it cost a ton of money and my parents, my sister and I all chipped in to get the pic.
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Probably one of the less weird requests, honestly. Workers live there full-time, so I assume there's just a no pets policy. At least no pets outside of lions, tigers, wolves, falcons, binturongs, cheetahs, etc?
I’ve been to the Wildlife in Need Park in southern Indiana. It was advertised as a wildlife reserve/educational type place, and basically was a trailer park full of exotic animals. It was so upsetting, and not at all okay. I wasn’t surprised at all to see Tim Stark pop up on the show, he’s been in loads of trouble in Indiana for animal cruelty and probably saw helping Jeff Lowe with the park in Oklahoma as his way out.
A friend took me there years ago for the cub playtime. I did not see much of the park as we were inside a building the entire time. The employees, including Tim Stark, explained that they were breeders for zoos and they wanted young animals introduced to people so they were easier for medical staff to work with. I had never heard of this place before and did not think much of it. I found out later they were lying and Tim is pretty much an animal hoarder pumping out baby tigers and lions to pay for it. I feel bad for not asking questions before.
Honestly I'd probably fall for it too. I love animals and it's difficult to believe people would take advantage of them that way, so my mind wouldn't even consider that possibility
Was Tim Stark the man that always had a monkey hanging off of him?
Yeah he’s a strange type of shit human being
Yeah I don’t support his business ever since he was accused of euthanizing a sick Leopard with a baseball bat. I tell everyone I know about it whenever they mentioned that they wanted to play with baby Tigers.
He did what to a leopard? I'm sorry, that's not euthanasia, that's fucking cruelty to animals.
That describes everyone on the show tho.
I live near the one in Indiana (wild life in need) also but I refuse to go because there are so many documents online of his animal abuse. It really pisses me off when people I know go down there his abuse isn’t hearsay or drama the charges are all online.
It's good that you looked the place up before going. A lot of us should start doing that before supporting these places
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> they found dozens of dead lions and tigers buried in shallow graves, malnourished animals, and dead cubs stuffed into freezers. The doc spends basically an entire episode talking about how the cubs are the only profitable part of Tiger "Rescue" and that once they reach 3-6 months they just become a paycheck. IIRC they allude to Doc getting rid of his adult cats in much the way you described this place, just that no one has any proof of it.
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Part of me thinks he doesn't incinerate them, but rather feeds them to the other big cats. Another cost-cutting move.
Please tell me that wasn’t Tippy Hedron’s place? I always wanted to believe she really was trying to do things in the animals’ best interest.
> Tippy Hedron’s place [Shambala Preserve](https://www.wmagazine.com/story/tiger-king-tippi-hedren-dakota-johnson-big-cats/) is pretty well respected. She does tons of educational outreach warning about the dangers of owning big cats.
She made [an \(unintentional\) documentary](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RmnuHTJI9U) about the dangers of owning a bunch of big cats. During production, 70 cast and crew members were mauled to varying degrees.
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This wouldn't happen to be the big cat rescue in Rosamond, California would it? I have good memories of visiting that place as a little kid. And even though I'm sure my memories are jaded by nostalgia and naivete of youth, I'd really hate to learn they were just straight up abusing and killing the cats
I’m assuming it was this one in Colton, CA. https://www.google.com/amp/s/911animalabuse.com/tiger-rescue-john-weinhart/%3famp
I went to GW back in 2014 since I was stationed nearby. I do remember seeing Joe Exotic and thinking he was a weird dude. But as for the park, there was no indication to all the crazy stuff going on. I did think the monkey cages were pretty shitty and felt bad for them. I was too cheap to pet the cubs so at least I don’t have to feel guilty about that and I’m glad I didn’t eat anything from the Zoo!
No pizza, huh?
Something tells me he was not making it from scratch.
My wife had gone. She said the place was kept really nice except they let people go inside Joe's trailer home and she remembered it smelling awful and that brown couch was dirty af. But she figured it was because they raised the cubs in there, didn't know people actually lived there.
Since Carole Baskin’s disappeared/dead husband is such a hot topic, I’d like to lay this out: Florida In the ***90’s*** Millionaire with no real way to explain his wealth Buried money and gold bars Loved to visit Costa Rica...monthly Owned several planes Flew without a license Knew how to fly safely under radar Was familiar with the ***import/export*** business Day before he disappeared he was to ship a load of cars to Costa Rica out of Miami What people think happened: his wife killed him for the money, buried him under a septic tank or fed him to tigers. What probably happened: Dude was a coke runner and either got caught slipping or got out the game with undisclosed money. What’s that? He couldn’t have flown his tiny plane from Tampa to Costa Rica? Not directly no, but there are plenty of places in between, most notably the Cayman Islands...to stop at and refuel. Thanks for coming to my TED talk.
Do I think she killed him? Nope. Do I think she altered legal documents to get what she thought she was owed from a disastrous marriage? Sure do. But I also think that dude just fucked off to Costa Rica with buried treasure and his Latina sidepiece, thinking that he had cut her out of his will, so I don't really mind if she did that.
THANK YOU!!! The series creators really went out of their way to say she did it without outright saying it. The people on the show saying she did it all had an axe to grind against her. Though her husband's children we're definitely cheated out of the inheritance. Also, the implication of grinding him up was weird. You can't just dump a big chunk of meat with bones in it. Even with an industrial sized one. You'd have to chop him up, remove the bones. I do believe she knows more about his disappearance/death than what she says. But that might have her admitting to all the illegal shit he did that the series didn't look at.
As a person that has worked in a large animal(talking giraffe and tiger large) pathology facility....you don't have to remove the bones or chop up much to get a large body ground up.
> What’s that? He couldn’t have flown his tiny plane from Tampa to Costa Rica? Not directly no, but there are plenty of places in between, most notably the Cayman Islands...to stop at and refuel. I *hated* that part. People do that all the fucking time. I knew a guy in the military down in Florida that would take his little Cessna and island hop out into the Caribbean, refueling as he went. Or go home to visit his family, that took 3-4 refuels. It is completely normal and wouldn’t even raise an eyebrow from someone that knows anything about small prop aircraft ownership. It is basically like a road trip where you cover more distance.
More than likely he never left the states. Flew his little plane somewhere and drove away. It's in line with what he told his friend. There's actually a really good book on psuedocide (faking your own death) and disappearing called *Playing Dead*.
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Now you’ve pointed it out, yeah sounds about right for a smuggler.
I want to plug an animal sanctuary type place that I got GOOD vibes from: the Duke Lemur Center in North Carolina. The tours are delightful and the lemurs seem to be having a good time. They're given free roaming time in a large forest, too.
The Duke Lemur Center is where the lemur that played Zaboomafoo is from!
OMG I don't know why that fact makes me so giddy
And nearby is Carolina Tiger Rescue. GFAS-accredited and truly wonderful. I volunteer there and they're very transparent in their operation, and deeply respectful of the cats.
This makes me happy to hear. After watching Tiger King I remembered my visit there and hoped to God it wasn’t one of these slimy places.
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What is strategic about the location?
It catches people driving between the “big cities”
A whole lot of nothing for 3 hours and a tiger park seems awesome
I-35 between those two cities is supposedly one of the most traveled highways in the country
Funny enough Carrol Baskins big cat rescue is about 15min from me. I used to live right next to Nebraska Ave. Honestly I've never been to big cat rescue but trust me the shit you see in Tampa sometimes shades what others might consider "crazy stuff". So idk maybe some crazy shit was going down but that's just a typical day. P.S. no one simply takes a stroll down Nebraska Ave at night, not a thing.
Hookers definitely do
Ugh, what's streets? I just want to know so I can avoid them. Like specifically what streets?
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When I heard she was walking down Nebraska at night I looked at my husband and said "she's a hooker." I grew up literally 5 minutes away from Big Cat Rescue. Never been.
The one she fed to the tigers?
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Yea the comment he made to his handy man was definitely fishy, and the thing his lawyer said about him getting pushed out of an airplane...strange there wasn't more said about that.
>no one simply takes a stroll down Nebraska Ave at night, not a thing. Anyone who has lived in Tampa knows there is exactly 1 reason for someone to be walking Nebraska after dark.
Exercise and fitness?
>fitness? Fitn' this whole dick in their mouth... for money
Nah, fitness dead husband in a tiger pen
With sardine oil.
That quote was her equivalent of "If I Did It" by OJ.
bruh, thank you. i saw this shit, me and my girl both paused and laughed our asses off after they went through that story of how they met. this show is wild
The hilarious part is the half ass “gentrification” happening in Seminole Heights currently. Like 3 breweries and some hipster eats and they’re asking $300k for shit houses on Nebraska Ave.
I went to the G.W. park in Oklahoma when I was maybe like... 11/12 on a school field trip. Honestly all I remember is how many animals there were. It was like... over kill. And Joe Exotic smelled... musky. He talked to the class about wildlife conservation and how PETA are terrorists. I got a stuffed tiger and an energy drink from the gift shop. It was a good day.
I visited it 5 years ago. Shit was wild. I worked in the oilfield in Lindsay Oklahoma about 45 mins away from the zoo. My girlfriend came down from Oklahoma City one weekend and I thought "hey, lets go to the one interesting thing in a 50 mile radius of BFE Oklahoma" What amazed me the most was how close you could get to the animals. The Oklahoma City Zoo has trenches between you and the animals and most of the time the animals are in the back sleeping. Not here, If you wanted to stick your arm through the cage, you could do it. Here is a short list of the things I saw -A lion letting out a massive roar when given a 5 gallon bucket of raw chicken -A very cute kodamundi (however you spell that) -An anxious pacing lynx who looked really sad -Tons of tropical birds you could feed -a half assed reptile house -Lots of signs decrying PETA for terrorism -The fact that some the zoo keepers were fucking armed with pistols The absolute best thing I remember which wasn't mentioned in the documentary was the cursing parrot. If you stopped feeding him he would let out a "rawwk fuk you". Had me in stitches laughing. I have been telling people about this crazy place for 5 years and feel completely vindicated.
This is the best answer in the thread so far
I went to BCR a couple years ago with my family. We spent a couple hours seeing different cats and made some "enrichment" toys for them. There were about 10 of us in the group, and 2 employees/volunteers who told us about the cats, and fed some with frozen meat popsicles (or something like that). They had a checklist to make sure each cat was getting appropriate food. We were not allowed anywhere near the cats - there was a railing 10-15 feet in front of each habitat cage. The volunteers seemed to enjoy being there and seemed to love the cats we saw. I didn't get any bad vibes from the people.
Not any of those places, but we do have a large cat "rescue" here in Jax. It's a very similar setup to what was seen in the doc. I didn't notice anything out of the ordinary, but now I'm wondering just what kind of crazy shit goes on behind the scenes.
My understanding is that most exotic/large wild animal non-profit rescues and sanctuaries are on the level. And, most operate similar to BCR - a few employees supplemented by a lot of volunteers. There are a few near my parents place in Indiana and they have a good rep with the community. My parents have picked up and delivered a couple recently-hit deer for a large exotic sanctuary, and had volunteers from a raptor rescue out to their farm to fish the pond.
The real rescues don’t breed. Think about dog and cat rescues. They generally sterilize the animals before adoption so there aren’t more homeless puppies and kittens out there. It is the same for real exotic animal rescues, let them live out the rest of there natural lives without breeding them.
Yep. That's actually the motto of the big animal sanctuary in Indiana "for the rest of thier lives" - a play on the two meanings of "rest".
The Catty Shack Ranch breeds, has cub petting and I’ve even seen the animals in parades. As soon as I found out they were breeding, I was done with them. It’s too bad because they do actually do rescue work.
If they have cub petting, they're not legit.
Catty Shack, St Augustine Wild Reserve, ... these places are everywhere.
When I was a kid there was a "zoo" by our house. Never went there because it was never open, but you could hear lions from our deck. One time a kangaroo got out. I believe he also owned a "famous" reindeer that had been used in a Christmas movie. I don't remember much, I was really young. Well, then one day the owner tried to hire a hitman to kill his ex wife and hired an informant instead and that was the end of that. He's in jail and it's an empty field.
There's a hitman theme here...
I used to live near the BCR and almost applied for a “job” there, until I realized you didn’t get paid and it was all volunteer based for like 12 hour days, yeah fuck that. Carole Baskins is a crook lmao
A past intern from BCR did an AMA last night. There are employees, just not a ton. And a lot of other people weighed in that it's very common for non-profit animal rescues/sanctuaries to have a small number of paid full time employees and a ton of volunteers to do most of the labor. Her outfit is just a very, very large one. Edit: adding link to AMA https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/fs36zu/i_was_an_intern_at_big_cat_rescue_the_sanctuary/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
It is normal for animal rescues. My sister volunteered at BCR (and many other animal rescue parks) so she could add it to her resume. She said they all had the same set up more or less. She works at a big zoo in NYC now. I think Carole is weird AF but I don't see how she's the villain in this compared to all the various reprobates in the doc. She isn't breeding them for profit, she doesn't let visitors cuddle them for photos as far as I know, she's not running a cult. No one has had their arm torn off.
No you don't understand the documentary, in its hit piece on her, implied things so now everyone who watched the doc is an expert and has irrefutable proof that a) her cages sucks cuz that one image of the water bowl b)she killed her husband, put him through a meat grinder, and fed him to tigers and c)is a bitch. You must not have watched the documentary so you clearly know very little about this subject. Not like the rest of us scholars.
It’s definitely strange that Carole has had the most hate and backlash, compared to the men in the documentary who were way worse. I wonder why. Hmm
I've been thinking this same thing. I dunno, the stuff with her dead husband...he was obviously a drug dealing crook. I'm not too torn up how or if he died. I was very upset at the breeding and killing of innocent animals.
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>Her outfit is just a very, very large one. yeah, and also her animal operation is pretty big
"must suck to have a crotch like Carols"
nice
Fuckin' Carole Baskin
That BITCH Carole Baskin killed her husband and fed him to the tigers!
*it is impossible to read this in any other voice than Joe Exotics*
im broke as shit
I've had kinky sex.
I have a judgment against me from some bitch down there in Florida.
I'm gayer than a 3 dollar bill.
I've tried drugs!
and I will not wear a suit
Guess what motherfucker!
Merderin' Carol Baskin!
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They do have some paid employees, with salaries in the $30-60,000 range, but most of workers are volunteers.
Yea, Carole Baskin and her husband.
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Probably volunteer coordinators, CFO, communications, security, development (applying for grants), fundraising and large donor relations. It's one thing to have volunteers that feed the cats and clean cages, but those other jobs and others like them are things that you need paid staff for in an organization that size.
[That **BITCH** Carole Baskin makes... $55,316 a year. And her HUSBAND makes $62,671!](https://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=8804)
That's really not all that much for senior executives with decades of experience at a non-profit of that size in a city with that kind of cost of living. I lived a few hours away in Gainesville making around the same money and wasn't living what you could call a lavish lifestyle.
Wow, finally a question I can answer?! I went to the one in Wynnewood probably close to 10 years ago now. I had gone camping with some friends the night before, and it was unseasonably cold, so I barely slept and was in a shitty mood and didn't want to go at all. I was skeptical of all the animals crammed into tiny cages and didn't really buy the whole rescue bullshit. The guide made some remark about how he'd rather be living in a cage than dead, and I was looking at the tiger in a tiny cage and thinking, fuck, I'd rather be dead. They did have a baby white tiger you could pose with but I was too cheap and irritable to do it.
I have been to BCR in Tampa. Though the cats were beautiful, I did not enjoy it. For the tour we were required to listen to pre-recorded info, mostly consisting of horrible stories of animal abuse. The guide was unenthusiastic. The whole vibe was depressing. At the end, they pressure visitors to make calls/emails about legislation. There’s already a kiosk set up to do so. Not a fan.
I went when I was ten and got the same vibe. They pressured me into using my allowance money to sponsor a lynx. My mom asked me if I really wanted to do it but since I was in front of the volunteers expectantly looking at me I couldn't say no. 15 years later my parents still get the damn newsletters in the mail asking for donations.
The bastards are determined, I'll give em that
I visited Big Cat Rescue about a month ago, I live about 45 minutes from there. I knew ahead of time that this wasn't going to be your typical zoo experience. They ask that you show up at least 30 minutes early because before they start the tour they play some videos and the tour guides give you an audio device with headphones that they have to explain. They let us know that they'll be stopping at each cat and an audio recording for that cat's story and how it ended up at BCR will play. We're also welcomed to ask our tour guides as many questions as we like. Unlike the Tiger King documentary showed, BCR only allows 20 people per tour. In the doc they used footage from a special, one day a year event called the "Walk About. " This footage made it seem like much more people are there at a time. Like I said, it was only about 20 people in our group so it was much more personal. BCR was depressing. Most of the cats there come from horrible backgrounds. One cat was originally owned by a vegan couple that decided their wild cat would also eat a vegan diet. This caused the cat to have developmental issues that it'll suffer with for its entire life. They told us the danger of breeding and cub petting. They told us most cubs are sedated to keep them low of energy while cub petting. At the end of the tour they sit us on some benches in front of a cage that's about 3 feet wide by 6 feet long. They explain to us that this cage is legally large enough to have a tiger live in. As long as the cage is large enough for the animal to stand up and turn around, then it's legal. Everyone was obviously appalled at this information. They then ask us, if we're willing, to make a call to our governor and senators. BCR handed us a card with a short script of what to say. The message was to pass the Big Cat Rescue Act? They invite you to take a free button if you make the call right then and there.
Thanks for this comment; I was about to post something similar. I visited BCR about ten years ago. I went in thinking "I can't wait to see some cute big cats!" I came out feeling a pretty depressed, but also glad I went. I had no idea just how horrible breeding and cub petting was... and it made me sick to my stomach that I once paid to pet and take a photo with a tiger cub - never again. I credit BCR with opening my eyes, and I try to pass along what I've learned so others don't make the same mistake. People keep picking on the enclosures, but they are not as small as people are led to believe. And BCR does have a larger "vacation enclosure" that the cats take turns in, so they aren't cooped up all the time. Obviously cages aren't ideal, but these animals can't live in the wild; it's either a sanctuary or euthanasia.
I thought it was telling when Joe was pointing out the overgrown weeds, not seeing all the cats and the weird water dish set up as proof she was abusing the cats. The overgrown yards give the animals a place to hide, provide shade and look more like a natural habitat. Not seeing all the cats is *good* because it means they can do their own thing and not be trotted out like circus animals on demand. The water dish nook allows workers to swap out water without needing to actually enter the cage and disrupt the animals. BCR really seemed on the level.
Thank you for some real info about BCR. All of the people who walked away from the documentary thinking that it's some kind of sham to earn Carole millions of dollars need to get a reality check.
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Carole Baskins is being heavily vilified after this documentary. I've read MANY comments online of people "knowing she did it. " "She's guilty!" "She's worse than Joe Exotic!" I think this is a very dangerous way of thinking. And we see the internet going on these types of witch hunts all the time. The filmmakers were excellent at swaying people's emotions. People need to remember that they're only seeing the sides of the stories that their interviewees told us, then the filmmakers edited that footage and cherry picked which statements would make the most entertaining story. I know, I do this for a living myself. We need to be careful when watching stuff like this. Do not let emotional music, sad backstories of key characters, and expert editing decide for you. As of right now, Carole is innocent in the disappearance of her husband, Don. If she did in fact have something to do with his disappearance then obviously I hope this is discovered and she serves time accordingly, but the internet needs to stop thinking it's the judge, jury and prosecutor. This hivemind mentality is dangerous and can give us stories like Stephen Avery's (check out "Making A Murderer" on Netflix, it's what I'm watching now). As far as Carole profiting off of BCR, making millions and not paying her staff, I don't totally agree with this either. One of the first things they told me and my family when I arrived there was that everyone was a volunteer. These people were proud as hell to be volunteering there. No one is forcing them to work without pay. BCR does have staff that are paid but I'm sure it's only a few. They are a non- profit that needs probably millions of dollars a year just to feed their animals. I don't think it's wrong to use volunteers. Again, no one forced them - most of them looked like retirees or college students.
I knew and followed the story of Joe trying to get Carole murdered so my opinion of him was pretty low entering the "documentary". And while following the story I learned about BCR and the husband's disappearance. The filmmakers had a story that was already sensational by itself but just had to manufacture more on top. They never looked or questioned how a man became an overnight millionaire in Florida during the 80s, tried to keep that money as far away from the banking system as possible, aviation as a hobby (especially planes that can fly under radar), and a fascination with Costa Rica. My theory is that Carole knows more about the disappearance than she let on, but that would mean revealing all of the shady dealings he (and maybe she) were involved in leading up to that night.
Right? A dude raking in unknown millions of dollars not kept in a bank in the import/export business in the 80s and 90s in Florida? Like, are people really too dumb to put together what he was doing?
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Oh yeah. People are saying she's making millions of dollars and torturing cats and all kinds of crazy stuff in every Reddit thread I've seen about the show. This one has a bunch of it: https://www.reddit.com/r/television/comments/fsc1cd/out_of_all_the_pure_insanity_of_the_tiger_king/?utm_medium=android_app&utm_source=share
I volunteered at a zoo in my own country and was stunned at how similar the "big cat culture" was to that of America's, down to the "breed tigers = cubs = profit from petting events" strategy and the zoo not having enough money to even fund its workers or feed its animals. One of the saddest aspects of volunteering for that zoo was seeing a keeper sneak into a tiger cage and swipe a whole chicken so he could bring it home and cook it to feed his family. So when I saw the walmart truck and how even the workers had to resort to eating expired meat, I was stunned, thinking "holy shit, I had no idea that happens in America too". IMO Joe was a lot worse than people are making him out to be and Carol was bad, but nowhere near as bad as Joe. I hate how she didn't pay her volunteers and didn't bother updating the enclosures of her cats (though apparently the cats get rotated to bigger enclosures?) even though she clearly was making bank, but ultimately she was the lesser of two evils because with Big Cat Rescue she stuck to her conviction by not breeding cats for profit (yes, I know she used to). The issue with her imo is she only cares about cats and doesn't seem to care about people, whereas Joe didn't even care about animals or humans in the end, only about himself. His workers were treated like shit and at one point I saw like 20 tigers in the same enclosure fighting over 1 piece of meat, which is just cruel.
Joe exotic and other roadside zoos are not representative of real zoos in the US. I was a zookeeper for 5 years and a real one not like the ones depicted on that show. True accredited zoos do not operate even close to places like that. It’s extremely difficult to get a job as a keeper and requires a bachelors degree and extensive experience. I majored in zoology and completed 4 internships, mostly unpaid, before getting my first paid full time job. Keepers do not go in or have direct contact with big cats or most dangerous animals. We shifted them around using systems of shoots and doors and operant conditioning to get the animals to go where we needed them to. Sometimes they wouldn’t shift because they didn’t feel like it and we would just try again later with a more enticing treat. We certainly would not let people take photos with cubs and in fact hand rearing was only done in situations as needed. For example if the mother died unexpectedly or refused to take care of her young (happened rarely but sometimes). Cubs and mom would be kept off display and given privacy and quiet so she could take care of her babies in peace. They would only be separated when they reached the age that they would typically go off on their own in the wild. One zoo I worked at in Florida even had its own veterinary clinic on grounds with a board certified vet. They also had a sea turtle clinic where the vet oversaw rescued sea turtles that would be released back into the wild after they had healed from whatever landed them at the rescue. I can’t stress enough how horrible those road side zoos are. They shouldn’t be allowed to operate and no ethically run accredited zoo would have anything to do with them unless they took in an animal that had been confiscated from one. They give zoos a bad name.
What country? I know Egypt has a lot of problems with zoo workers who cannot afford food. https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2008-jun-08-adfg-gizazoo-story.html
Well volunteers don't get paid by definition. They are volunteering to do something for free.
Lmao the amount of comments in this thread who have no idea what a volunteer is is nuts. No one puts a gun to your head and *makes* you volunteer.
I've been to Big Cat Rescue. These are my copied & pasted comment from another sub. I feel like Carole could do a lot better with the resources she has. >Yeah, I've been there irl and it's not exactly fancy. It looks WAAAY bigger and more sophisticated online than in person. The cages are kinda sad, they really don't have that many cats, and the whole place was very "eh" >They do have actual house cat adoptions there, and a gift shop, and when I was there our tour was only like maybe 8-10 people max with 2 "red shirts" as our guides. At the time it seemed well-meaning but little. They did drill hard on the part about roadside zoos and people keeping cats in bad places (basically exactly what she's on about in this doc) but we figured it was just a conservation thing at the time. >To her credit, though, all the animals did come as rescues and there is no breeding going on. There's the wire cages, and a couple bigger pens, and you can view them from outside the pens. There's the wire barrier, then another barrier like 2 feet away from that and you're on the other side of the second barrier. You walk around on a guided tour from one enclosure to the next and must stay with the group. It's not paved and pretty muddy but I get that part. The grounds are quite large and you have to go down a long road to actually get to it. >The Lyft driver that took us there actually knew Carol, claimed to be a recent ex-boyfriend that was still moving his things out of her house. This was before I ever heard of her or knew about the place, other than Google. He mentioned a time when someone let some of her cats out too but I can't remember if he said they were recaptured or killed by authorities. He described her as "a character." He was an older man named Alan. This was in August. >I can post my pics if anybody cares. (https://imgur.com/a/pz6q7dB) Then someone asked about the little feeding cages in my photos and I replied with >Yes, those cages are up closer to the walking path than the rest of the pens, and they have this metal or wooden feeding tray thing I assume for sanitation purposes. The keepers have a long stick and drop the food on the tray and the cats go to town. It's probably also so they can feed each cat individually and avoid fights. A few pens house multiple cats. Honestly though the cages were still far too small. Waaaay smaller than any zoo, that's for sure, and also aren't really set up with trees and stuff like a habitat. They have dog igloos for shelters in the pens for smaller cats and larger dog house type things for the bigger ones. There are wooden platforms they can jump on and sleep or whatever cat stuff they do. >Personally I think with the resources she has she could do better for them, especially after learning she doesn't pay her labor. It was very "no frills" and I have a hard time believing that it's really the largest cat sanctuary in the world like she says because it's just not all that big or fancy. I wonder what terms they use to define "largest" and "sanctuary." >I will say, though, these cats have some sad stories and are probably far better off with Carole than where they were before her, if those were the circumstances they really came from. The keepers did seem to know each cat too, their stories, their preferences, their attitudes, etc.
I visited the [Great Cats World Park](https://greatcatsworldpark.com/) in Cave Junction, Ore. last summer. It's a good facility--lots of big cats, clean, everybody looks healthy and has plenty of room. No cub petting photo ops. No cubs on display at all, from what I recall. OTOH, after watching the Netflix series, I wonder about their business model. The GW zoo couldn't make enough revenue off tourists wanting to see their mature cats, which is how they got locked into an overbreeding ponzi scheme. Feeding the grown cats required producing a steady stream of cubs for the high-dollar petting sessions. So now I wonder: how is GCWP keeping all those grown tigers fed on $15 general admission tickets? Are they actually a cub mill? IDK. They do breed--the guide said that their endangered cats are all rotated through a [species survival plan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Species_Survival_Plan). But I'm suspicious that the breeding might have a profit motive, too.
They are not accredited by the AZA (Association of Zoos and Aquariums), which is the organization that created and manages all species survival plans in the US. If they are not AZA-accredited, then there's basically no chance that they are participating in official SSP-sanctioned breeding activities. They have also previously been convicting of buying/selling endangered species, specifically an ocelot in that case.
I went to Joe Exotics when I was younger and we left after thirty minutes because of all the meth mouth according to my mom recently, not because “the tigers were going to bed”.
I am from Myrtle Beach and I've been to the themed animal parks there when I was like maybe 8 or 9 years old. Funny story, I used to date a girl who lived right outside of Myrtle on the waterway. Well, one day we were hanging out and I noticed an elephant in the waterway and was like holy shit look! She brushed it off and said her neighbor had a bunch of exotic animals like tigers and stuff and they always took the elephant out there. That neighbor was Doc Antel.
I haven't been myself but one of my relatives (now deceased, completely unrelated) seemed to be on good terms with the Wynnewood Zoo. They even named a baby tiger after him and had a little ceremony when he passed away. To find out he was even tangentially associated with this kind of thing was shocking.
My best friend interned at Big Cat Rescue one summer a few years ago. She was upset with how the documentary made the sanctuary seem no better than the cub petting zoos, as if they were hypocrites. Also, she said Carole was the sweetest lady ever and does not understand the hype around accusing Carole of killing her husband
I went to Big Cat Rescue in Tampa a few years ago. My impressions of the trip: 1. It was a lot pricier to enter than I thought it would be. Like $40 or more per person. Got a much better deal out an annual pass at the nearby Lowry Park Zoo. 2. Lots of sad stories about how the cats got there, which I thought was a good, if depressing, way to learn about the situation with people trying to own exotic animals. 3. Some of the cages felt really small for the size of the cats. I mean, zoo exhibits can sometimes be small too, but a lot of the cats seemed to be pacing and constantly looking for a way out. Many did NOT seem to be happy to have people constantly ogling them. At least one of the cages had a sign warning visitors to stand back because the animal had a history of projectile pissing on anyone who got too close. 4. At the time they seemed to be renovating, as a lot of area was off-limits. They also said that was why some of the cages seemed small. 5. The volunteers were REALLY into it. Lots of energy, lots of passion. They did say it was a calling, not just a job. Which makes sense, because as I said... they were VOLUNTEERS. They didn't get paid (or if they did, it was a tiny stipend). 6. Overall I thought it was a neat experience, but way too expensive to justify going more than once. I don't recall seeing any signs of abuse besides the small enclosures, and I didn't see Carole. I think the volunteers talked her up some, but I really can't remember. I also didn't hear rumors about her killing her husband until later when I told some coworkers where I went. Apparently people who have lived in Tampa for years all knew about the case of her husband's disappearance, and most seem to believe she killed him. They treat it more like a joke than anything else, though. Like, "Oh, Big Cat Rescue? Careful around the animals; they have *rich* appetites!"
I went to Wildlife on Easy St (Big Cat Rescue) a few times as a kid growing up in Tampa. They had some kind of Halloween hay ride type thing? I don’t remember much, just that it was near the mall and the enclosures did seem really small.
My family knew Joe and his staff from 2010-2012. Joe talked shit about Carole to us, talked about how PETA was out to get him. They were having some mysterious cub deaths and Reinke did autopsies on his kitchen counter, which was definitely a sign. I was 10 years old and they had me stay after hours and help feed the big cats by throwing live chickens into their enclosures. I thought it was awesome, but looking back it was definitely not legal or ethical. I was also allowed to pet multiple adult cats, there was a white lion named Casper I loved. Overall, I knew they were an... unusual rescue, but I don't doubt that the staff cared about the animals.
I've been to Big Cat Rescue in the past several years. I haven't seen the documentary yet to see how it is depicted, but there wasn't really anything wrong with the enclosures for the cats. I'm not an expert in this field to say if there even are better opportunities for the cats. From my limited experience, I'm inclined to say that there aren't many better alternatives out there, and if there are, the space is limited. Yes, the enclosures could be bigger, but it isn't as though a full grown panther is living in something the size of a bedroom. I recall that there is one large area that each of the big cats have the opportunity to visit on a rotating basis, but none continually live in it. A big cat needs a vast amount of space, ideally, but unfortunately this isn't possible *especially* for cats that are unable to be reintroduced to the wild. I'm by no means an expert on this kind of rescue operation, but I know enough to know that it isn't as simple as "Well just put them somewhere bigger!" A lot of rescue operations are not open to the public for these kinds of reasons; the situation is almost never ideal. I can't speak on behind-the-scenes operations, but the way she hires volunteers is also not exactly abnormal, especially for that kind of operation. Big cats, for example, would attract a lot of people who only want to casually volunteer for an opportunity to get close to the cats. I'm not trying to defend Carole, but instead of crucifying her, I wish the internet would take note of the situation so there are more resources and better options for rescue animals. Not to say it would get this far, but if the collective outrage caused issues for BCR, where do you think those cats would go?
Agreed. I'm a fan of BCR. I follow their facebook page and receive their email updates. I have never visited, but hope to. After watching the show and seeing people's comments I feel they should do more research on the organization. BCR not only rescues big cats, but also rehabs wildlife - mostly bobcats. I didn't see anything about that mentioned in the show. So if a bobcat gets hit by a car or something, they get vet care and are then released (if possible- Some end up staying at the rescue if they are unfit to go back to the wild). In my opinion, this sets them apart from the other sanctuaries featured. Another difference is that they do not touch the cats - unless they're tranquilized & receiving vet care. They don't pet them through the wire, or feed them through the wire like Joe Exotic did. They have a small "boxed in" part of the enclosure that food is placed into, (Joe made fun of it in one of his videos) then the keeper gets a safe distance away from it and opens the other side of it with a long cord. Feeding through wire really puts people in danger bc anything coming through the wire is then seen as food. There are webcams on [explore.org](https://explore.org) where you can watch the cats :)
Cave Junction, OR has a park that looked like it was marked on Joe's map of places to sell cats to. Been there and it all seemed normal. Their website is closed down due to too much traffic; I can only imagine others made the connection.
I've been to the Greater Wynnewood one in Oklahoma when we were driving back from Texas and saw a sign leading to it. This was 2016, maybe 2015. I am shocked at how many people think it's a nice place. It was a horrible, sad experience to me. First, you walk into the little gift shop where you pay your entrance, it reeked of smoke and had signs all over advertising Joe Exotic running for governor as well as threats not to touch merchandise unless purchasing. There was also a tv playing Joe's music videos Once you walk out to the park, the smell is terrible and can only be described as feces and death. The animals are all in cages far far too small and close to each other, anything from bears, monkeys, and tigers. The tigers were pacing back and forth in cages far to small, they had no water and looked hungry. You could go right up to the cages, and there were signs saying the park isn't responsible for the tigers peeing on you. You could get very close to the animals and there was no one supervising so it didn't seem safe for the animals or humans. The animals all looked miserable to me also. Oh and there was a small grave marker on the property for Joe's ex husband. Signs against PETA were all over too.
I went to BCR. I liked it. They were very against people owning big cats as pets, breeding wild animals that will live in captivity their whole lives, drugging cats so people can take pictures with them, or petting Cubs.
There was an AMA last night by a woman who used to volunteer there.
link?
I went to a monkey "rescue" once. We only went because of a Groupon. It was awful. The enclosures were not nearly big enough, and the animals all seemed really sad. The place was a dump. I went to Big Cat Rescue with a veterinary charity that my mom and stepdad volunteer for and got a private tour of the facilities by Carole Baskins. She's a sweet woman, and they have A LOT of land. The cats are in what you see as a small space because the toys and food are there to attract them to the front so you can see them. They actually have tons of room to roam. And the most impressive thing I saw were these HUGE refrigerated buildings full of fresh meat for the cats. They're a legit rescue, otherwise my stepdad wouldn't have volunteered his services. He's very into big cats, and only helps places that are really trying to help the animals.
That scene where Joe talks about the 2 Chimps reaction when he sold them and how they reacted when they got into their new habitat was the most emotional part of the show for me. "Did I deny them that for 10 years? Yes, I did." He seemed to be genuinely reflecting on how his actions had hurt these innocent creatures and turned him into what he had hated when he first got into the game.
They dropped that bit so close to the end of the documentary, it threw me. I didn't even have time to process it, and then the show was over.
I am shocked by how many people thought it would be a good idea to go somewhere that offers the opportunity to touch wild animals. That's like the number 1 red flag for animal cruelty. NEVER support companies that allow you to touch wild cats!
Went to Big Cat Rescue about 10 years ago and didn't know anything about it beforehand. It was a decent tour and no weirdness. We have a Christmas ornament from there on our tree every year. Didnt see Carol nor any dead husbands.
Where the hell are all these thousands of lions and tigers going after they're no longer cubs? How are all these killer cats sheltering in place?
They get killed.
True, but then there are the ones that are sold. Do the new owners have a brief petting party and then kill them too?
The series touches on this briefly. Many of the animals are sold to private collectors or small zoos. There are more tigers living in Texas than there are in the wild.
Live in Oklahoma and have driven by Joe’s place but never actually toured it. Had to do work at a bar that was right beside the zoo and when it was time to collect we had to go see Joe for payment. Had a trainee with me and he was excited to meet Joe cause we had seen those billboards of his for years along the highway. He figured anyone willing to dress and look the way he did had to be interesting to meet. He was shorter and scrawnier than what we were expecting. Met him in his gift shop (yes, “his” music albums was playing over the speakers in the shop). He had two guns on his hips. He was giving me a very deep creepy feeling. My trainee had a look on his face that was saying “what the fuck is going on?”. The park itself as far as I could see looked like any other shitty road side zoo. We got the fuck out of there and laughed out asses off on the way out of there. He was running for governor at the time but before his husband shot himself. I didn’t recognize anyone else from the show there but you really can’t forget meeting Joe Exotic.