When you see her have fun with her two pets, 400-pound Bengal tiger Janda and 600-pound white Bengal tiger Saber, you’ll recognize why– they’re about as loving and playful as their tiny domesticated cousins.

” As far as they’re worried, I am mother,” explains Haley. “They rub me in the face, they’ll let me kiss them on the nose.” The two tigers live in an enclosure in her backyard and are fed by hand 3 times a day.

Everything began in 1995, when Haley decided to stop her boring desk work and, at her husband’s advice, begin working with exotic animals. She has actually had quite a few different big cats ever since, and lots of volunteers to help take care of them and play with them as well.

” People who consider it cruel to keep them in captivity have a factor, to a factor,” conceded Haley. “It is not the ideal place for a tiger to be, in a cage.

But at this moment, in the wild, there isn’t a lot hope around for them anymore, and if there aren’t a few of them left in cages there aren’t mosting likely to be any type of left at all in a number of years from now … They are provided for and enjoyed here. In my opinion, I wouldn’t mind being a tiger in my backyard.”