Tiger's Midnight Rescue

Tiger was stuck 50 feet up a sweet gum tree for 7 days in Greensboro, NC.  His human had calling everyone she could think of including arborists, animal control, and the fire department but no one was able to help.  Tiger is the classic skittish cat - indoor/outdoor, only tolerates being touched by one person in the household, scared of strangers, etc, so I knew I expected that this would be a tough rescue.

I got there at dusk and set my line about 50 feet up the tree just before darkness fell.  As I got close to Tiger he jumped away from me and higher up the double trunked sweet gum tree.  I followed him up the tree (I was much slower) via head lamp light for another 20 feet.  I was at 70 feel in the 85 foot tree and Tiger was only about 8 feet from the very tippy top of the tree.  Thankfully it was quite narrow so he could not go out to the edge of the canopy.

When I reached the net up to try to coax Tiger down to me (still no noises from him the whole rescue) he jumped down past me and pin wheeled all the way to the ground.  Thankfully some dense foliage slowed his fall and at one point I think he may have been holding on to a branch for a moment because the tumbling sounds stopped.  Then he fell to the ground and landed in a small pile of stick and brush.

Later that night he showed back up at home and all accounts are that he was weak and irritable but otherwise OK.  That is pretty remarkable considering his midnight tumble from 80 feet up!