James: It is an adrenaline rush,
knowing that there is that big of an apex predator right next to you.
There’s been a few times that I’ve been a little concerned for my safety.
The lions are the ones I have to be more careful with.
There, there’s body language you can kind of gauge
what mood the animal is going to be in.
And if we feel that they are in one of those moods,
we give them their space.
You’re talking a 455 lbs cat.
Stop.
It could take them getting mad over something little
and that’s it you’re not walking out of that cage.
Come on Diego, come on.
My name is James and I am the lion dad.
The first time I’ve ever had an interaction with dangerous animal,
was 13 years ago.
Before the exotics I had never worked with something that could
potentially if it wanted end everything.
There’s been a few times that I’ve been a little concerned for my safety.
We transport sharks sometimes for our other facility,
and the shark’s spine had grabbed by swimming trunks
and it could have ended a whole lot worse than what it did.
Our morning start with getting the food ready for everybody,
checking the waters, making sure that the enclosures are clean.
We check the animals over for health
and make sure that nothing has happened overnight.
Eden’s roughly 20-25 years old
and when I first started working with her she was a little aggressive.
When they are in food mode they could be extremely dangerous.
I like to rub my hand on them
to let them know I’m not,
I’m not food so they don’t view me as food.
Now Eden is big enough if she wanted to
she could eat a small person.
They're one of the few snakes that are classified as people eaters.
Right now she's roughly 15 foot so she could
easily eat a small child, if she just decided to.
Sheri: With a full company James has been with us for about 13, 14 years.
I think James has a natural ability.
I think that he was made to communicate and be with animals.
That is really a gift.
James: All of our animals are rescues.
They come from either other facilities,
whether it be they can no longer take care of the animal,
or the facility is closing down, but they're all rescues.
So where we're headed now is to our British Columbian wolves,
Nikato and Waffles. These guys are
one of my favorite animals to work with and
probably the ones that I'm the closest with.
They were abandoned by their mother at five days old
and we bottle raised them from that point.
So I've spent a lot of time with these two.
Danger wise, they can be dangerous. They are wolves.
They don't really trust a lot of people and with the wolves,
everything's built on trust with these guys.
Come here,
come here, come here bubby. You’re okay, come on.
Nikato is roughly 140 to 145 pound wolf.
Can you show me your teeth. They do have big canines.
With these guys with them being a wild animal,
they could kill you especially with two of the wolves being in here.
Even one wolf, if he's out to hurt somebody,
physically you cannot stop him.
can have upwards of 1600 pounds of pressure per square inch in their jaws.
He could break bones with a bite. But with wolves, they're not these
super aggressive animals down to hunt and kill people,
like movies and TV portray them to be they are one of the sweetest animals out there.
The big cats are a lot more cranky than what the wolves would be.
We're about to go feed the big cats and with that it can be
exceedingly dangerous. Every day is completely different.
The food brings out that the predator in the predator,
if they wanted to take you out, it's a matter of seconds.
One of the things you do have to watch, while feeding them is
where your hands are at because
you get your hand on the wrong spot and they
can get your fingers instead of the chicken.
But you're talking a 250-300 pound cat that right now is a year old,
that's going to end up being a 450-500 pound cat.
It could take them getting mad over something little
and that's it, you're not walking out of that cage.
The Lions are the ones I have to be more careful with.
There, there's body language, you can kind of gauge mood, the animal is going to be in
and if we feel they're in one of those moods,
we give them their space.
Come here, come here Thanos come here.
So these are our African lions Zella and Thanos.
Zella is a female Thanos is our small male.
Zell's almost three years old Thanos is going on two.
Not really scared right before I go in, but there's always,
that cautionary thought of what kind of mood the animal’s in.
I get knocked around a little bit, but they've never severely hurt me.
If they wanted to it’d be a matter of seconds
if these guys wanted to do something,
especially with two of them being in the enclosure at the same time.
And now it's time to go in.
As far as they're concerned, and as far as I'm
concerned, in a real way I am their parent.
I did take the position of their mom.
I bottle fed them, I meat fed them their first meals of meat.
Zella one of the things she started doing at a very young age,
and she continues to do it sometimes is every now and then she'll suck my thumb.
you’re a good girl.
Now as far as her doing this, she is she is a large cat.
She has a lot of strength in her mouth,
roughly 450 to 500 pounds of pressure.
So if she ever decided she didn't want to give my thumb back,
there's nothing stopping her from taking it.
As far as the feeling goes, imagine wet sandpaper wrapped around your thumb
with water on the inside in a vacuum cleaner.
And then you get a whole bunch of slobbers.
Sheri: Well a lion sucking on a thumb is a little bit weird.
But I do know that he and Zella have a really unique relationship.
The cats understand him and he knows how to read them in such a way
to be able to respect them as well as to give them the love that they need.
James: It shows that they are family animals, they're pack animals by nature.
They have to have someone something to bond to.
And in the beginning it was me and I've just continued to build that relationship
with those said animals.
Hey come here, no,
no, you're not jumping on me. I'm not playing.
Quit.
Behave. You behave.
I'm going to shift you, you better quit.
So as you can see, it doesn't always go as planned.
He was getting a little rambunctious. So we put him up for a little bit,
basically, like you would a kid, he goes into timeout.
He's technically still a toddler. He's only a year and a half old
way it could have been the new environments and new smells.
As far as wanting to do anything else in life, not a chance
I wouldn't give this up for anything.
And the relationship with these guys, it just gets stronger and stronger every day.
But just like any other relationship, you're going to have hiccups
as you saw earlier, but
you move past them
and tomorrow's another day.