Baruch College hosted a real-life bearcat on Oct. 20, giving many students their first look at the animal behind the school’s mascot.
The Office of Student Life brought Boomer, a live binturong, to the campus for the “Ultimate Bearcat Experience,” a Homecoming event where students, faculty and staff could take photos with him.
“We decided to bring a binturong to campus because so many of our students did not realize it was a real animal,” said Damali Tolson, Director at OSL.
Many of Baruch’s CUNY rivals chant, “What is a Bearcat?” which prompted OSL to use that question for its marketing campaign.
Student Life Deputy Director Dinetta Curtis and Assistant Director of Activities Stephen Palencia worked with an event vendor to bring Boomer to campus. More than 300 members of the Baruch community came to meet him.
“I did not know Bearcat was an actual animal. I thought we were called Bearcats for whatever reason,” Vaishnavi Gaur, a senior majoring in entrepreneurship, said.
“I have never seen a bearcat. I didn’t know what it looked like before, to be honest,” Adelissa Brito, a junior majoring in public affairs, said. “I wanted to pet it, but he was in a cage, so I was kind of sad about that.”
Some students helped the visit happen. Thania Begum, a junior majoring in accounting, worked behind the scenes with the Student Life office, assisting with sign-ins and explaining the rules attendees needed to follow.
“I have seen it hundreds of times as a logo on flyers and merchandise and as our mascot at campus events,” Begum said. “But seeing the mascot and a real bearcat side by side was an incredible, unbelievable experience that I can hardly put into words.”
Despite its nickname, the binturong is neither a bear nor a cat. It belongs to the Viverridae family, alongside civets and genets and is the largest member of that family, weighing around 20 to 44 pounds.
Binturongs live in the tropical forests of South and Southeast Asia, from India, Nepal and Bangladesh to Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia and the Philippines. They spend most of their lives in the treetops and are mostly active at night.
Researchers have found that their long tail can grip branches like an extra limb, making them one of only two carnivores with that ability.
They also play a big role in their ecosystems. Binturongs mostly eat fruit, especially strangler figs, and are the only known animal that spreads strangler fig seeds. Their digestive system softens the seeds’ tough outer coat, helping them sprout once they leave the animal’s body.
The binturong is listed as vulnerable to extinction, and its population has fallen by more than 30% over the last 30 years. Logging and farming are destroying its forest habitat, and people also hunt the animals for meat or to capture them for the pet and traditional medicine trades.
Binturongs are also known for their hot, buttered popcorn scent, which comes from glands near their tail and helps them mark their territory.
“I smelled popcorn, and I was like, maybe it’s the popcorn that was popping upstairs,” Shantelle Myers, a junior majoring in business administration, said. “That’s really weird to smell like popcorn, a particular type of thing that we eat.”
Myers said she expected a bigger animal and was at first worried about Boomer being kept in a cage. The handlers told her he grew up around humans and is used to that environment.
Gaur said she first guessed Boomer was a type of sloth or fox. The handlers told her that most people guess wrong.
“I want students to know the Bearcat is a real thing and much like binturongs, Baruch shares their characteristics of being resilient, resourceful, adaptable, distinctive and impactful,” Tolson said.
Gaur also made a social media video for Student Life about the traits that make a student a Bearcat.
“I do see that in the students at Baruch,” she said. “Knowing that these are the traits of the animals too was really interesting to me.”
For Kevonna Fowler, a senior majoring in journalism, the visit raised a different question. “It made me think about the process of how schools determine a mascot, because I feel like a bearcat is pretty random,” Fowler said.
“I thought it was cute! It made me less stressed thinking about what midterms I had,” Deanna Duran, a sophomore majoring in marketing, said.
For Begum, the day was one she will never forget. “It was truly a once-in-a-lifetime moment,” she said.