Sketch People by T. J. Banks
Author:T. J. Banks [Banks, T. J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781462400423
Publisher: Inspiring Voices
Published: 2012-01-12T00:00:00+00:00
From Birds to Big Cats:
Tippi Hedren & Shambala
(This interview first appeared in Just Cats!, Jan./Feb. 2001 as part of my âMaking a Difference⦠. â column.)
As actress and animal-rights activist Tippi Hedren sees it, âMy modeling career and my entire acting career were all a stepping-stone to this.â âThisâ refers to her work at Shambala, the big-cat refuge that she started in Acton, California back in 1981. It is, she adds simply, âthe most important thing in the world to me.â
She doesnât dwell much on either of those previous lives of hers but admits that her roles in movies like âThe Birdsâ and âMarnieâ have given her âa sort of window. A person who has celebrity is able to call attention to certain causes.â She finds it interesting that three of the actresses who worked with director Alfred Hitchcock â Kim Novak, Doris Day, and herself â have gone on to champion various animal causes. âI donât know,â Hedren muses. âIs it because of the honesty of the animals? I donât want to bad-mouth Hollywood, but Hollywood can be very hurtful. Animals are very honest, and itâs a wonderful thing to know an animal. I love all animals, but getting to know a wild animal is fascinating.â
And she has had plenty of opportunities to be fascinated. Shambala, which officially became a wild-animal preserve in June 1983, thanks to the establishment of The ROAR Foundation (âActually, we were a preserve before we knew we were one,â Hedren comments with some amusement.), is home not only to lions and tigers but also to cougars, leopards, a jungle cat, snow leopards, a Florida panther, an elephant, several servals, a cheetah, a bobcat, and a liger. The latter, Patrick, is the result of a happenstance romance between a lion and a tigress. âHeâs very, very beautiful,â the actress says of the hybrid cat. âHe seems to have the best qualities of both.â
Patrick wasnât born at Shambala â he came there courtesy of a small zoo â but many years ago, a tigon (a cross between a tiger and a lioness) was. They donât buy or trade animals and havenât bred any since 1981, Hedren explains, but âwe had a birth like this at Shambala because we had two tigers who werenât getting along, and when they fight, they will fight to the kill.â One of the malcontents was put in with some of the lionesses: it turned out that one of them was in season, and the tiger âwas only too happy to oblige.â Ergo, the tigon.
As her conversation quickly reveals, Hedren has developed an ever-deepening love and understanding of the wild cats at Shambala (which, in ancient Sanskrit, means âA meeting place of peace and Harmony for all beings, Animal and Humanâ). âTheyâre all absolutely, totally different in personalities,â she enthuses. But that enthusiasm doesnât blind her to the facts. âWild animals canât be tamed, and I can attest to that. So can my entire family.â It disturbs her that far too many lions and tigers âare being kept in peopleâs backyards without proper facilities.
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