Wildlife Waystation Owner Cited

The director of the Wildlife Waystation in Little Tujunga Canyon was cited in Arizona this week for having a Bengal tiger on the property where she plans to open a rescue facility similar to the one she founded here about 25 years ago.

Arizona Game and Fish Department officials said Martine Colette did not have the proper permits to keep the 20-week-old male tiger she said she obtained in January. Authorities cited her with illegal importation of wildlife, a misdemeanor, and seized the cub.

“Officers spoke with her about it several times,” said Rory Aikens, a spokesman with the Arizona Game and Fish Department. “The law in Arizona says you must have a restricted live wildlife permit for tigers.”

Aikens said Game and Fish officers first discovered the tiger earlier this year while doing inspections associated with Colette’s effort to obtain a permit to establish a wild animal rescue facility. Colette still runs the Wildlife Waystation here and plans to go back and forth between California and Arizona once the new rescue center opens.

She acknowledged that Arizona Game and Fish officials visited her Mohave Valley, Ariz., property several times to discuss permits but never mentioned the cub.

“They never told me I couldn’t keep the tiger there,” she said.

Colette said she got the Bengal, a native of India that can grow to 600 pounds, from a woman in Missouri who contacted her after a man dropped the cub off at her dog grooming shop.

“The tiger got ill and she panicked,” Colette said. “She was afraid it could die.”

So Colette told the woman to send the tiger to the 160-acre Wildlife Waystation she runs above the Valley.

A sanctuary for nearly 1,300 wild and exotic species, the Waystation shelters sick, abandoned or abused animals ranging from black bears and boa constrictors to lions, jaguars and leopards.

“It was too cold and the airline wouldn’t transport [the tiger], so I got in my truck and met her in Texas,” Colette said.

She took the cub to Mohave Valley, where she has conducted educational workshops for years at local schools with animals she has rescued.

“I nursed him back to health,” Colette said. “They know me. I’m not a crazy lady that bought a tiger and put it in a cage. I would do anything in the world to save an animal’s life.”

Colette’s court date is March 15. She plans to get the cub back and eventually obtain the zoo permit necessary to open a wild animal rescue in Arizona.

“Part of the reason I selected northwest Arizona is because there are no zoo or wildlife facilities there, nothing for children,” Colette said.