An inconclusive list of things I learned about jaguars in the year 2007
- Jack
- Dec 1, 2025
- 9 min read
Paulie: Good evening beloved rats! Whether you’re an OG from our Substack era, or a new member of the Rat Readers group, welcome to the revamped, sexy, erotic(?) Rat Depot newsletter. Over the last few months, Jimmy and I have read and provided feedback to more than 70 submissions from all over the world. We’ve read everything, from flash fiction to DnD campaigns and narrowed our search to four new writers.
Today, you’re meeting Jack Boulton Roe. A writer and crisp enthusiast based in Liverpool who submitted the fantastic short story you’re about to read. Jack has written award winning fiction, published his own collection of short stories whilst also writing some really funny and insightful non-fiction pieces that we love too. He’s a lovely man, with a great sense of humour and a penchant for a deep dive on the last thing you’d expect.
But that’s enough from me, let’s get straight into it! Welcome to Rat Depot, thanks for being here.
- Jaguars, comparative to their size, have the strongest bite of any big cat.
- They use their uncommonly powerful jaws to crush the skull of their prey.
- Like polar bears, eagles and orcas, Jaguars are an apex predator, the top of their food chain.
- They are strong swimmers and tend to live in woodland, or other covered areas.
- Although usually spotted similarly to leopards, there are also ‘melanistic’ or dark-pigmented variants. These, in turn, are sometimes referred to using the umbrella term ‘black panther’.
I knew these things because every fifteen year old boy in Corby knew these things. We knew these things because at least one, possibly several, dark furred adult jaguars had escaped from Woburn Safari Park, less than fifty miles away. Reports varied as to how many handlers had been skull-crushed to death, but we knew of at least one. He, the handler, had been concerned as one of the adult females, Cleopatra, had begun to refuse food, thereby also refusing a carefully monitored and administered course of sedatives and antibiotics and becoming sick. He had taken personal responsibility for the care of this jaguar, overseeing a revised diet and a strict programme of care. He reported early for work, sometimes as much as two hours before the start of his shift, in order to ministrate Cleopatra’s care. He called her Cleo. He called himself Robert. His friends and family called him Bert, because his dad had selfishly taken both Rob and Bob for himself. Cleo called him nothing, because she was an adult female jaguar. Cleo’s health improved, under the care of this determined and diligent handler. Bert however, possibly due to over work, had failed to maintain proper levels of sedation. Cleopatra, responding to a surge in long-suppressed predatory instincts, had crushed the handler’s skull, and scaled the woefully inadequate exterior fence at dawn. Bordering the broad expanse of flatland along the eastern edge of the country, the long drained fens, sunrise in Woburn can be a particularly striking thing. Cleo strode out, neck fully extended, tail swishing. A rumbling proclamation of joy caught, for now, in her teeth still dripping red from the very much skull-crushed Bert.
