Archive for the 'Big cats' category

A lion on a wall of death - Getty Images

Thanks to PierreD, here is a photo of a lion on a “Wall of Death”. These circus and fair attractions included a fast car rushing on a vertical circular wall. In some cases an animal (preferably a large predator like a lion) was in the car – or the side car.

If you know a little more about these, feel free to comment here. PierreD is very interested in whatever information you would have about the cars invovled (often Maruttis in India, but others too).

This happened in Turkey, in a zoo.

A tiger found a way to leave its cage to meet a neighboring lion. This was in Ankara zoo and the tiger thus demonstrated its superior strength. Or that the lion does not fight well when it is surprised napping after a meal.

There are still six tigers and two lions in the Ankara zoo.

Source: BBC.

Or how can a grass-eating prey keep its calm even among the most aggressive predators.

Sometimes, cats love more than others.

Pink panther true love

photo credit: jurvetson

King cheetahs are not so exceptional that you can’t see them in zoos (but you may have to travel to meet them). I wondered if it was possible to list of zoos of the world which have at least one of them in exhibition.

• DeWildt Cheetah Research Centre, in De Wildt (South Africa)
• Kapama Game Reserve (South Africa)
• Taronga Western Plains Zoo in Dubbo (Australia, NSW)
• Kgosi: animal ambassador from the Wild Cat Education & Conservation Fund in Occidental, California (USA).

Of course, such a list cannot be permanently up-to-date without the help of the readers of YLoveBigCats. Please, feel free to comment to add new locations (or tell when the last king cheetah of a zoo unfortunately died, as it happens sometimes).

Locations which previously had king cheetahs:

• Jama: Canberra National Zoo (Australia) – Was initially acquired from De Wilt Centre
• Singapore zoo in 2004
• Some king cheetahs have been spotted in 2005 around Tshukudu game lodge, in South Africa

King cheetah in Zoon Tycoon 2

If you play Zoo Tycoon 2, you may “adopt” cheetahs. Did you know that, with the help of chance, if you adopt a sufficiently large number of cheetahs, the game will offer you a king cheetah (easily recognizable by its fur more striped than spotted)?

‘Big Boy’ and ‘Leonardo’ are the names of two of the GPS-collared desert lions living in Namibia under the constant surveillance of animal researchers. These big males fell under the bullets of trophy hunters, even with collars and in a protected area.

It’s a pity, but these hunters will kill anything and anywhere. In this case, this will be a major blow to the small population of desert lions (a specific adaptation of the African lion to dry weather conditions).

Photo: Hunting Ventures

Source: Bush Warriors.

London is a city marked by centuries of colonization when Britons crossed the planet and brought back memories of the conquered countries including many representations of lions (both from Africa and from Asia). London kept it as innumerable statues celebrating the King of the Animals.

Londonist has a map of all these attractions sometimes dating back much further in time: Lionist.

Via Neatorama.

This one does not like Calvin Klein

I don’t know if (and I doubt that) Calvin Klein latest technology-based perfume, Obsession for Men, can live up to the expectations it raises. This musky scent is supposed to attract women, run them wild with its potent aroma. However, wildlife photographers in the Maya Biosphere Reserve in Guatemala found that it could be used to attract jaguars, cougars and pumas to the camera traps used to get pictures of the endangered cats. Apparently, this does not only attract male jaguars, but females also like the cologne from Calvin Klein.

This was so marked that Seattle’s Woodland Park Zoo tried it on snow leopards too. This works! Consequently, the Snow Leopard Trust will try it in South Gobi, Mongolia. Remember that snow leopards are so difficult to find in the wild that apart from GPS collars, it may take months for experts before they can find one in some of the most difficult terrains.

I guess that this will soon lead to a Ig Nobel prize in the future. And some nice new photos, too.

Source: Wildlife Conservation Society – Guatemala Program

Some species of mammals are clearly confronted with the immediate risk of extinction. And, when I shoot photos of some of these at the other end of the world, I am often shocked by the immense chance I have to be able to still see these animals free in the wild for the years they have left.

For example, cheetahs were submitted to a major event of reduction in genetics diversity during the last Ice Age (less than 10,000 animals fought for survival during thousands of years). Today, the enormous competition pressure brought by Man and “its civilization”, on top of the stark competition from other carnivorous mammals (like hyenas), will most certainly bring cheetah out of the African savannas in a few years (maybe less than 20 years).

Tigers are also in a nearly desperate situation today: The last wild animals are already living in relatively small Reserves where, even free in the wild, they have become tourism subjects without being fully protected from poaching or illegal culling.

This is the context when Frédéric Lepage created a series of TV documentaries about a few emblematic species (cheetah, orangutan, tiger, elephant, jaguar, polar bear): Extinctions

I strongly recommend your being in front of the TV (France 5, French TV channel), to watch the episode for Tiger, on Friday 6 August 2010 at 20h30.