I recently got to visit the most wonderful compound, in the southern part of Florida, called Panther Ridge Wildlife Sanctuary, and is staffed by wonderful people, and has an equally wonderful cat family. Anyother really neat thing about visiting, is that I learned something new: I didn’t know that Clouded Leopards chuffed. I thought it was a tiger and snow leopard thing, but I am very happy to be wrong. There is, in fact, quite the population of Clouded Leopards at Panther Ridge, and this little lady is one of them.

Melly is an older lady, but still very sweet and social. When you approach her cage, she will perk up and stare at you, and decide if she wants to get up and say hello or not. Usually, she will, and will greet you with both chuffs and gentle chit-chat, but what she really wants is for you to step right up to the cage wire, kneel down, and start with the scritches! Of course, isn’t that what every cat wants?

So, this is Melly, a very nice, gentle, and sweet-spirited lady, who’s an awesome example of her kind.

This picture was taken 24-Jun-07. The image was taken with a Canon EOS 10D and the EF 28-200mm f/3.5-5.6 USM lens. The original was taken at full frame of 3072x2048x24b, ISO eqv 400, 1/90 shutter, f/5.6. This image was shrunken down and cropped for space conservation.

Disclaimer: I hate to have to put this on here, but the pic is copyright me. Please do not distribute, copy, alter, etc, without my permission. Having said all that, feel free to download and use it for your own inspiration.