Couple who bought sickly kitten from local zoo now live with 90lb puma

A couple who took in a sickly kitten from a zoo, have found themselves living with a 90lb puma.

Mariya and Alexander Dmitriev fell in love with 'sickly' Messi so much when they saw him at their local zoo that they offered to buy him.

To their surprise, the management said yes.

Nursing the weak puma cub, now two-and-a-half, back to the health, the couple fell in love with the wild cat even more and decided to keep him as a pet.

They have since adapted their hallway into a puma play pen.

The couple have even invested in a special coat and harness for him so they can take him for walks in their hometown of Penza, Russia.
Mariya, 28, said: "His name is Messi, after the famous footballer.

"He got his name from the zoo in Saransk where he was born, who had three puma kittens and decided to name them all after famous players in honour of the World Cup.

"When Messi was three months old he was sold to the zoo in our city Penza. That's where we saw him for the first time and it was love at first site.

"We had three days of thinking hard about whether it was moral to keep a puma, and whether it was common sense to have one. But nothing could fight our sudden wish."