AR-News: (US NY) Buffalo native fights 'national epidemic'

[Animalara2003 at aol.com]

By TOM BUCKHAM 
News Staff Reporter
4/12/2004 

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Michael Markarian visits one of the tigers rescued by the Fund for Animals 
from an illegal breeding operation. 
As president of the Fund for Animals, Michael Markarian is used to horror 
stories about creatures in distress. 
But nothing in his experience as an animal advocate prepared the 30-year-old 
Buffalo native for the macabre scene uncovered a year ago in Colton, Calif. 
Acting on a search warrant, state wildlife officials raided the home of an 
illegal breeder, where they found 90 tiger carcasses, including 58 cubs. Many 
animals had been chained to car bumpers and left to starve. 
Fund for Animals representatives who accompanied the agents discovered 11 
infant tiger and leopard cubs, some just days old, stuffed in a crawl space. Two 
more juvenile tigers, malnourished but alive, were located elsewhere on the 
property. 
Afterward the state seized 54 animals still housed at the breeder's business, 
a place ironically named Tiger Rescue, from which 10 sick tigers had been 
removed the previous fall. 
Under the nonprofit fund's care, nearly half of the 75 big cats have been 
rehabilitated and placed in accredited facilities. After an emergency $250,000 
fund-raising campaign, the remaining 39 will be moved later this month to a new 
10-acre sanctuary in San Andreas, Calif., complete with dens, trees and pools. 




full story:

http://www.buffalonews.com/editorial/20040412/1021361.asp 
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