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Showing posts with label lions. Show all posts
Showing posts with label lions. Show all posts
The 'King of Beasts' threatened by extinction in Western Africa
Plagued by underfunding, little governmental support, poaching and indiscriminate killing by cattle herders, many of the countries in Western Africa have little control or incentive to save the few remaining western African lions left in the wild.
Six years ago, the big cat conservation organization, Panthera, began an important surveythat would involve trekking through 17 African nations, in search of the elusive West African lion, historically considered a sub-species of Panthera leo senegalensis.
Source: Here
Source: Here
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Lions
Lions remain to be one of the most widely recognized creatures in the world, with countless symbols and symbolisms linked between lions and various cultures and sub-cultures.
The central subject in the 2004 released movie entitled Pride, the feature delved into the world of lions, focusing on the lives of two lion cubs growing up and dealing with the harsh realities of the wild. Combining actual lion cub footage with computer generated graphics, the movie featured the voice talents of Kate Winslet, Sean Bean, Martin Freeman, Rupert Graves and more.
As one of the world’s big cats, the lion is considered to be the second largest of the group, with Tigers being the biggest. With male lions defined by their manes, male lions are known to have weighed as much as 250 kilograms, with a number of these known to weigh even more.
Found in Africa and in parts of Asia, the lion is regarded to have been one of the most widespread mammals prior to the Pleistocene era. With lifespans known to range somewhere between 10 to 15 years (more when in captivity), lions are considered to be the most social of all the big cats, typically found in groups composed of females an alpha male and younger males.
As big cats, lions are mostly nocturnal, given the fact that they sleep most parts of the day. As large and as majestic as both male and female lions are, their populations are currently at risk of being endangered, one which countless initiatives and efforts are intent in putting to a halt, in repopulating the lion’s dwindling numbers.
Lions Video
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The 1996 movie entitled The Ghost In The Darkness – starring Michael Douglas and Val Kilmer – took a different take on the strength and power of the lion, this time depicting them as man killers who are intent on having human beings as prey. Based on a true story which took place in 1896, two lions had been causing unrest in a railroad construction site in East Africa, believed to have been responsible for killing 130 people.
For one, lions are known to sleep for at least 20 hours a day, which practically means they are active for only short durations of time, though this is dependent on their activities and such.
Highly sociable, lions are considered to be the most sociable of all the big cats in Africa, with a group of lions consisting of around 15 members at a time. Within that group, it is the females which do all the hunting, as the males simply partake in the catch females would bring back to the group. Males are also the first to partake in the feast.
As the lion’s roar has been legendary, the average lion’s roar can actually be heard through long distances, reaching as far as 5 miles away. As long as the range of their roars are, the average lion can also run as fast as 50 miles per hour, though these speeds are mostly during short run-distance bursts. Also, a lion can leap distances as wide as 36 feet.
One contradictory thing about lions is that they may be dubbed as the “king of the jungle”, but their natural habitats are mostly plains and grasslands. Also, it has been proven that you can easily assess the age of a lion through the color of its mane. The darker the hue, the older the lion typically is.
Though they may not exactly be the kings of the jungle, lions continue to be one of the world’s most well-loved of the big cats family, proudly standing as symbols of strength and power.
Lions Video
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']]}Male Lions
For children who grew up in the 90s, the animated film The Lion King is likely to be a fixture in their childhood. Widely considered as one of the Disney’s best animated films and one of the most critically acclaimed animated movies of all time, The Lion King captures the magic of how Disney movies should be. The film tells the story of young Simba, a lion cub eager to take his place as ruler of the pride but meets challenges along the way, including excile, no thanks to his uncle Scar, long jealous of Mufasa, patriarch of the pride.
Male lions inspire a sense of awe in people, perhaps due to their impressive manes that encircle their heads. In the animal world, larger often means better, and for male lions, the larger their fringe the more females are attracted to them, increasing their chances of finding a mate.
Interestingly enough, male lions are often smaller in size to lionesses, but their manes give them a larger appearance. One unique character about the male lion though, is its virility. Male lions are on average, capable of mating for at least a hundred times in just 24 hours. Mating is such a strong instinct for male lions because it’s their key to survival—it builds the pride around them.
Male lions who are unable to join a pride of their own often die, becoming depressed due to lack of social interaction as well as becoming easy targets for other lions who aggressively defend their territory.
Male Lions Video
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']]}Too Close for Comfort
We all have that dream, where we get to casually hang out with Tigers, treating them as though they large scale versions of their domestic feline cousins.
But as we dream, we are all quite aware of how different Tigers are from domestic cats in the real world, with one swipe from them resulting to more than just a skin-deep scratch.
An undercover Human Society employee was also quite aware of this fact, upon discovering that workers of an Oklahoma-based wild animal park allowed children to come in close contact with some of its tigers.
The organization has filed a number of complaints against the wild animal park, citing instances of animal abuse, and the unsafe security/safety practices implemented by the park, defined by how children were allowed to come close to its tiger cubs. The organization has also noted the death of five tiger cubs in the past, which if proven to be true, will leave the park with a lot to answer for.
GW Exotic Animal Park owner Joe Schreibvogel is convinced that the Humane Society is intent in creating noise, in an effort to generate more donations. Given that the park stands to be one of the largest of its kind (exotic-animal parks) in the United States, Schreibvogel claims that the park’s status makes it a target for organizations like the Human Society.
As investigations and inquiries are still ongoing, it is too soon to note if the park or the Humane Society are exactly in the wrong, but we’ll be featuring pertinent updates over here, once they come out.
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