HOUSTON — An anonymous tipster in Houston called authorities after discovering a grown tiger inside a garage at an abandoned house on the city's southeast side last week, according to news reports.
The tipster told police he had gone to the house to smoke pot and said that, when he first noticed the tiger in a rickety cage in the garage, he thought he was hallucinating, KPRC-TV reported.
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The tiger's cage was not locked and the garage was secured with just a screwdriver and a nylon strap, police told KPRC.
Here's the tiger being loaded into a trailer. Officials said it will go to BARC tonight and a permanent home will be found soon. MORE ---> https://t.co/Qm7RW8ScEG #kprc2 #HouNews pic.twitter.com/8dRuiNLTTc
— KPRC 2 Houston (@KPRC2) February 12, 2019
UPDATE: Man smoking pot finds tiger in abandoned house, says he thought he was hallucinating, according to police https://t.co/Qm7RW8ScEG #kprc2 #HouNews #SometimesHeadlinesWriteThemselves pic.twitter.com/0e8fBgM78h
— KPRC 2 Houston (@KPRC2) February 12, 2019
The tiger was tranquilized and removed from the house to a local animal shelter, but will be relocated to a permanent facility soon.
The Tiger Conservation Campaign says only 3,500 tigers of all subspecies of the big cat remain in the wild.
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