EFRC Director Joe Taft said the party features 60 of the estimated 215 cats onsite, and the staff has filled approximately 140 pumpkins with meat to place in the enclosures.
Once the pumpkins are placed in the enclosure, the cats are either playful or ?skeptical, Taft said.
“It’s a toy that they don’t get on a regular basis, so lots of the cats are really inspired by the toy, they get really active and play,” Taft said. “On the other hand, some of the cats walk out and look at the pumpkin and say, ‘That’s not my lunch.’”
The event, which Taft said is in its seventh or eighth year, brings an average of 200 to 300 people to the center, an increase from the crowd on any given Saturday at the EFRC.
The party is unlike the average guided tour of the facility in the sense that rather than seeing it with a tour guide, visitors are able to walk around and visit whichever enclosure seems most interesting.
“We have a lot of cats here that are in large, habitat-rich enclosures,” Taft said. “You see them really up close, and they’re amazing animals.”
The Pumpkin Party is the center’s last main event of the season before the smaller-scaled Christmas event, Taft said.
The party is expected to last from noon to 2 p.m. Saturday. General admission is $10 for adults and $5 for children 12 and younger.
The EFRC was founded in 1991 to house abused, abandoned and mistreated exotic felines, according to the ?center’s website.
Throughout the past five years, the center has taken in an average of two new cats per month. The center is home to more than 215 different big cats, representing nine species and coming from 24 different states.
The assortment of lions, tigers, cougars and leopards are fed 3,000 to 4,000 pounds of meat per day.
The EFRC encompasses 108 acres of land in Center Point, Ind., located approximately one hour northwest from Bloomington.
