Shadow’s a female black leopard who arrived at the sanctuary in 2015. At 19 years old, she’d already gone from the Ashville Game Farm to a private owner’s backyard cage.
Shadow’s owner had waged a long, legal battle to keep his four big cats. It had been a high-profile case for years. Local zoning laws changed, and his cats hadn’t been ‘grandfathered’ in. He was ordered to find them another home or face jail time.
With an ill wife and disabled son, he accepted a plea bargain and agreed to place them elsewhere within a year. He truly loved his cats. We set aside our opinions about private ownership and worked with him for almost a year to safeguard these cats’ future.
Shadow had lived in an 8’ x 33’ cage for so many years there. She’d had medical issues in the past, too.
Life at the Sanctuary
Two years after arriving at our sanctuary, Shadow survived two emergency surgeries for a uterine mass and subsequent infection from this mass. We were so afraid we were going to lose her. But even at 16, she was such a fighter and pulled through heroically, as if she were half that age!
She’s a very social leopard with such a sweet disposition. When caretakers are around, she’ll roll over on her back, flipping back and forth, making a rumbling noise that sounds like a purr. And she loves just about any type of enrichment, she’s so playful.
But, when it comes to neighbors, she’s very picky. She makes it very clear who she does and doesn’t like living next door. Since she prefers calmer senior cats over young active ones, we make sure she’s always happy with the purr-fect neighbor!
How You Can Help
Our sponsor program helps support geriatric cats with special needs like Shadow. Would you like to help by becoming Shadow’s sponsor parent? Or even a one time donation toward her care would be awesome!
It’s easy to do using the buttons you see at the top of this page. Thank you for caring about her welfare, too.