Love at First Sight
by Tracy A. Bye

I am a school teacher and the first day of school is always exciting. I may feel a little nervous and stressed from the pressure of getting my room ready , planning lessons and having everything "just right" for my students before they walk in to our room on that first day, yet I am always excited to meet my new class. It is quite a transition from being outside, around animals all summer, to being emersed into a first grade classroom. Little did I know that this year, the first day of school would have a whole new level of excitement!

The bobcat kitten was brought to me from a woman who had found him outside of Hayden. He was brought to me during lunch on the first day of school. The moment I looked into his eyes, I knew it was love at first sight!

I had never seen a bobcat before. In pictures and on calendars, yes, but never in real life. This kitten was the cutest thing I had ever seen. His name became Jeremiah.

Jeremiah was little - probably the runt of the litter. It is thought that his mom abandoned him because it was a late litter and he was the runt. Another thought was that his mom had been poached and he was left without a mom. I will never know why he was without a mom, yet I feel so thankful that I got the gift of becoming that to him.

Throughout the afternoon I worked to get Jeremiah to drink and then that evening I worked to get him to eat. What an exciting day at school! When he was eating and drinking regularly I began to feed him using an adult bobcat puppet. He was truly a joy to my whole family. We loved watching him play and growl, purr and sleep. Each day he worked hard to survive and was so stoic in coming to new surroundings and not having any bobcats around.

Bobcats are easily imprinted. So all of us had to watch that he stayed wild and that we didn't ruin his chances of living his life in freedom by loving him too much. As he grew and grew I began looking for another wildlife rehabilitation center that had some other bobcats wintering over. There is a wonderful wildlife rehabilitator in Del Norte ,named Susan Dietrich, who was willing to take Jeremiah. She had two female bobcat kittens around his same age.

He was transferred to Susan in late December and as Susan writes to me, "is doing bobcat things." He has become a great hunter and is dominant with the females. He had the courage to survive and the strength of spirit to become a great hunter. In April we will travel to Del Norte to release him to live a life that he deserves - one of freedom and of greatness. I love Jeremiah. He has taught me to love all bobcats. I learned so much about them while he was in my care. He showed me how the spirit of one little bobcat can add so much to the first day of school . . the lives of my family and to our world.

I treasure the days I have gotten to spend with Jeremiah. It truly was love at first sight . . . second sight. . .
third sight . . . and forever more.