Please change your spots!

A few weeks ago I was on a trek in the jungle not far from the farm and I heard a quiet ‘meow’ from some bushes near-by. I am always very careful in the hills but this sound was very docile and so I decided to investigate. I parted the branches and staring at me with such big soulful eyes was a cat!…at least that was my first impression! What a strange colouring; tan-brown with big black spots! It immediately reminded me of a baby leopard! But we don’t have leopards around here…do we? For sure we have had tigers a few years back but they seem to have retreated back into the hills…but leopards? So very carefully and slowly I reached down and picked-up this weird looking kitten! It obviously was not very well and was very thin. Maybe the mother was around here too? No, I thought not, this little kitten was lost and needed help. So I took him back to farm, fed him warm buffalo milk and kept him in the dark to keep him relaxed and calm. The next day those big eyes gleamed much more healthily and so I fed him some raw meat and more milk. I contacted my friend at Chiang Mai Zoo with a description and some snaps and an immediate response confirmed that he is a Leopard Cat! (Prionailurus bengalensis). Not an endangered species but quite common in these parts of Asia. I have called him ‘Micey’ and everyday he improves and gets stronger and I can now hold him without fear of being scratched or bitten! My friend at the zoo told me that Leopard Cats inherently hunt birds but can be tamed so we will see how it goes…I would so much like to keep him if I possibly can and so in this case I really hope that this Leopard can change his spots!