Message From James

Hello there everyone! 

I hope you have all had a great Christmas, I have actually been pretty busy this time of year so unfortunately I have had very little visits to zoos. However I did get to Linton last weekend and I do have some pictures for all of you to see which will be posted as soon as possible. But just for you all to see, below is a picture of Zuri from that visit.

You have to admit that he is absolutely magnificent in this photo, he really is a stunning individual, one of the finest in the UK!

I have also heard some fantastic news that Louisa, the daughter of Zuri and Safi born on the 16th May 2009 who now resides at Longleat Safari Park, while her two twin brothers are still at Noahs Ark Zoo Farm at Kent has had cubs! Louisa has had four cubs (two of each gender) along with other lioness Nikita (born at Blackpool Zoo) who has also had four cubs (two of each gender). Here is a link to the Daily Mail and the Longleat website for more details. There will be a post on this news story when I have the time to write it with a lot more information and photos. However meanwhile here is a photo below from the Daily Mail article and does not belong to me.

I am certain that Louisa is the lioness to the right with her head to the side of the camera with Nikita being the one to the left. It is fantastic to see her with her cubs making Zuri and Safi grandparents again!

I will make sure that all photos from my Linton visit and the information and photos regarding Louisa's cubs will be on their own post very soon. I also intend to start the new year with a visit to Whipsnade tomorrow so I will make sure to take many photos for you all to see.

And as always I continue to update and work on the blog to make it easier to use and contain as much information as possible.

Wishing everyone a Happy New Year

James

Twitter!

Having now bought a smart phone for the first time in my life I am now looking at the features that I can use for the blog.

Twitter is something that I have never ever used, however now it is directly linked to my phone I thought I would use it. The Twitter page is my own personal page, but the majority of what I tweet will be linked to as i'm sure you would all think, Lions.

It also allows me to post photos up directly from my phone, so that you can see things straightaway.

Another reason for using a twitter, is that not everyone has a facebook so here is a system for all of you tweeters out there. Click on the photo below to link you to the twitter page.

Enjoy!

Paradise Wildlife Park Turkana - 4th December 2012.

I have wanted to visit Paradise Wildlife Park again for some time now, but when I heard about the death of Mana earlier this Summer, talked about in this post. It made me more conscious to get there quickly to see how Turkana was doing.

Unfortunately my camera battery died almost minutes in to my visit, however with my new fancy blackberry phone I took many photos on there of Turkana which I should be able to get onto the internet no problem at all. Below are the three pictures I took of Turkana with my camera.

Turkana is compared to the lions at Linton Zoo and other collections, pretty small. Talking to his keeper I learnt that his father Blanco was also a small lion, so it is probably just his genetic make up. However despite his slightly small size you can see that he is perfectly built, he does not have short front legs or anything like that. His mane is not too big or too small, and fits his body quite nicely. He does have a rather long face with a pointy chin compared to some of the more rounder faced lions in the UK at the moment (Riziki for example). 

For those of you who don't know Turkana was born at the zoo on the 1st July 1996. And he lived with his litter mate Mana. Turkana had many hernia operations when he was younger and it was thought that he would not survive to adulthood, however here he is! Sixteen years later age is beggining to show his coat has got rather pale and he does have a slight skin complaint that isn't seeming to bother him too much at the moment. His mane is definately loosing the dark colouring and is in the inside almost as white as the white lions that are at the opposite end of the park. However in behaviour and mobility there is no problem at all, as he was bounding around the enclosure when it was time for food. All of the loss of colour is natural, it is not normal for a lion to live this long, it would be incredibly rare to find a wild lion at this age, so loss of hair and colour is just a natural process of old age. It is also natural for healing to get slower, so scars and sores from his skin complaint will take longer to heal, this again is just a natural process.

Turkana is incredibly well looked after by his devoted keeper Nick Loudon who near enough spent the entire day caring for him. Turkana has a huge hay bed just for himself, as well as his own heater attached to the roof of his house, so with lots of TLC Turkana is going to have a very happy retired life indeed. Turkana does not seem to be too worried about the death of his sister, according to Nick he knew that she had died and he has been coping really well from it, just as long as he has the company of his keeper to see him. 

Turkana is more like the wild lion that you would find in the wild, he is not too big like some of the captive bred lions were bred to be, and he does not suffer from any inbred features, short legs or a stunted appearance. Turkana is a superb lion, doing fantastic for his age. Apart from suffering from a few natural old age processes such as loss of colour and hair and a seperate skin complaint, he is doing perfectly fine. 

'T' as he is known will if he keeps going the way he is still have a couple more years atleast left in him, and fingers crossed he will be around for that much longer. Hopefully I will get to see him next year and I will pop round on my days off from work to see him and Nick.

I hope you have all enjoyed reading this post on a very special lion indeed, Turkana was the first lion that I ever saw and even though he is looking a bit old now, he is still fighting on, and has some years still left in him, and there is no doubt at all that his keeper Nick will make sure that he is always in the best of health in his care.

Cheers

James

Woburn Safari Park Lions - Afternoon 30th November 2012

So here is a follow on from my earlier post on my circuit around the lion reserve this morning. Now here are my photos from my two circuits in the afternoon!

Due to the lions being so active, and there being eight of them, I did make sure I took a photo of everything that happened, as you can see by this incredibly lengthy post!

Just to clear up a few things the pride at the moment is the leftover cubs from the old adults. All of these cubs were born from two sisters Tamby and Amber, they themselves were both born at the park. Their fathers were Sly and Shane, these two boys were brought in from Knowsley Safari Park in 2003 after the death of Tamby and Ambers father Legs Diamond and his companion Romeo. After quite a few litters, several cubs got sent of to different zoos, and the first cub born to Tamby was Riziki. Many of you will know that Riziki currently resides at Linton Zoo, which was were he was sent to be hand reared with his cousin Karla.

So with crossing different names off my family tree I can be certain that the individuals left in the Woburn Pride are...

The three castrated males Bala, Flint, Ace and their sister Tyra. These four were born on the 26th April 2004 to Tamby and Sly, this makes them direct siblings to Riziki.

And out of a process of elimination from the records Woburn have sent me it seems that there is a further litter from Sly and Tamby born on the 4th October 2005 and that these females are Dakota, Abi and Codie. 

The remaining female should be Tullulah who was born to Sly and Amber on the 26th March 2004. Her two remaining litter mates are now at Colchester Zoo.

So as you can see the pride is now made up of the 'leftovers' from a succesful breeding pride, a mixture of brothers and sisters now that all of the generation above them have died. Tamby died only three or four months ago, which would have made her 14, which is a reasonable age for a lioness. I was also told that her sister Gemma who would have been born in 1992 died rather recently too, making her a lot older than Tamby.

Here are all of my photos from the afternoon for you to see...

This one particular female above was creating quite a stir trying to escape the eyes of the landrover on more than one occasion, eventually towards the end of the day she got away with it, and the rest of the pride came to join her as they made their way towards the house and holding area to be shut in for the evening.

As you can see the pride made it out, and you can see all of the different shapes and sizes that vary from individual to individual all of them are different including the castrated males, they were fascinating to watch especially as they moved straight past my car without a care in the World! One of the boys must have been close to brushing my bumper as he went past as he was incredibly close. However for these guys having a car watching them is nothing new, so they looked at me without any further glance at all.

 

This picture below has to be one of my favourites of the day. You can see the entire pride spaced out within the reserve and you can see the huge extent of the reserve itself. 

For me, this visit to Woburn was a really odd but inspiring visit. This is where my love for lions really started to grow, and the last time I came to visit Woburn more than six years ago all of the adults were still there and all of the lions pictured today were all cubs. It really does show how even in a short amount of time everything can change. These lions are following the footsteps of many many generations who lived in this reserve before them, and as time goes on, hopefully in the future they will continue to do so.

As you can tell it was quite an emotional visit, especially seeing Kasanga for the first time. 

Woburns pride does seem to have stagnated over the past few years were the lions who have seperated have continued to breed. For example their siblings at Linton Zoo are now great grandparents, making this group here three generations behind. This shows how quickly things change in lion society.

The three castrated boys really just do look odd to me, with their fluffy bellys and puffy faces, and extremely butch bodies they do look incredibly out of place. However a few years back, Woburn did used to advertise to have the biggest group of lions in the UK, perhaps this is what these guys were here to do. Sadly this is no longer the case and with only eight individuals the pride is now the smallest major pride in the UK.

It does look like that in keeping these three boys in the pride, they may have made the long term future a lot harder than it could otherwise have been, it may mean having to exclude them permanently from the pride if they do not accept Kasanga properly. However Shane seemed to do a very good job of keeping them in order, lets hope Kasanga can, he is still very young and so I am told a bit of a woss! So we shall have to wait and see. The good news is that the lions do all seem to get on well and after a few moves in the last year or two, squabbles and fighting does now seem to be at a lower level.

I really do hope that Kasanga integrates well as it is about time that a proper lion was wandering around this reserve, it is just what it deserves.

Cheers

James