lion

It seems to work well enough. But it is important, both as warning and clue as to how to foster peaceful relations among humans, to note that this cooperative relationship is supported by a fortunate happenstance of resources. Had they not been raised from a young age together, if there was more competition for food, water, space or mates the interactions might not be so bucolic.

If you want to promote peace between people the message is that you raise them together from an early age and make sure resources are readily available so they don't have to stress over getting what they need.

Lions!

gregladen — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 15:07:42 +0000

Lions!

This is a lion:

Click the picture for a larger version of the photograph. Photo by Greg Laden.

And here are selected blog posts about lions and related beasts:

Lion by Greg Laden is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.

gregladen Sat, 02/11/2012 - 10:07

Tags

Cat

lion

Panthera leo

Greg did you ever eat lion?

Not yet.

Your Lion Eyes

jgoldman — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 08:30:00 +0000

Your Lion Eyes

I was traveling last week, and I'm traveling again this week, so the posting is fairly sparse around here at least until after the weekend.

In the meantime, enjoy this awesome video. It was shot at Tswalu Kalahari Game Reserve. The camera was left on the ground to record lion movements. A curious lioness found the camera and I'm sure you can guess what comes next.

(h/t Casey Rentz)

jgoldman Thu, 06/02/2011 - 04:30

Tags

lion

Cubcam! See the world through the eyes of a cub getting toted around for a bit!

I know the goal in wildlife photography is complete unobtrusion, but I still am amused by things like this.

Photo of the Day #923: Lion cubs

laelaps — Sat, 22 May 2010 06:42:25 +0000

Photo of the Day #923: Lion cubs

A lion cub (Panthera leo) stalking its sibling, photographed at the Bronx Zoo.

laelaps Sat, 05/22/2010 - 02:42

Tags

Hunters and the Hunted

laelaps — Fri, 21 May 2010 14:37:43 +0000

Hunters and the Hunted

A Cuban crocodile (Crocodylus rhombifer), photographed at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C.

Outside of the trash-grubbing black bears I occasionally come across when driving to hikes in northern New Jersey, I never encounter large predators near my home. The imposing carnivores which once roamed the "garden state" were extirpated long ago. This is a very unusual thing. For the majority of the past six million years or so hominins have lived alongside, and have regularly been hunted by, an array of large carnivorous animals, but humans have not been entirely helpless. Rather than a one-sided war, our relationship with large predators is a deeply-rooted and complex exchange in which we have eventually come to fret over the survival of the animals we have traditionally feared.

The contents of a cave in Sierra de Atapuerca, Spain emphasize the long-running tensions between our species and large carnivores. Described in the Journal of Archaeological Science by Ruth Blasco, Jordi Rosell, Juan Luis Arsuaga, JosÃ© M. BermÃºdez de Castro, and Eudald Carbonell, the Middle-Pleistocene-age level TD10-1 of the Gran Dolina cave preserves a moment in time in which the hunted may have become the hunters. Along with stone tools, level TD10-1 contains the remains of bears, wolves, horses, elk, bison, lions, and other animals. Many of the herbivore bones bear cutmarks made by stone tools, but, interestingly enough, so do a lion fingerbone and rib. The additional presence of a lion lower arm bone (a radius) fractured as if it was slammed against something or whacked with a stone hammer suggests that the humans occupying the cave ate just about everything on the lion that was edible, from meat to marrow, and after they left small carnivores entered the cave to gnaw on the scraps still clinging to the carcass.

Cut marks on the rib of a lion from Gran Dolina cave. From Blasco et al. 2010.

The evidence is clear that humans butchered the lion to which these bones once belonged, but how they obtained the carcass is uncertain. Even though hunting a lion is a dangerous prospect, such events have been recorded among modern people, particularly the Maasai in which killing a lion is part of cultural initiation rites, and so the researchers assert that this particular lion was hunted in a rare episode by the people living in Gran Dolina. Yet this is not the only possible scenario. Perhaps the humans stumbled across a recently dead lion or killed a lion which was prowling around the area out of defense and decided not to let good meat go to waste. The hunting scenario is certainly plausible, but it is not the only possible way in which the events could be reconstructed.

The cutmarked lion bones may indicate that prehistoric humans did not always come out the losers during interactions with large predators, yet the rarity of cutmarked carnivore bones attests to the danger creatures like lions presented. Even if lion tasted good, it wasn't worth the risk to go hunting it regularly, and despite our present ability to defend ourselves against or kill large predators there are still places in the world where people are still killed and eaten by big carnivores. One such place is Mozambique, a poverty stricken nation in southeastern Africa, and according to a new report by Kevin Dunham, Andrea Ghiurghi, Rezia Cumbi, and Ferdinando Urbano wildlife killed 265 people there between July 2006 and September 2008 (though, as the authors point out, the incidence of attacks on people is still low compared to raids by wildlife on crops or the number of domestic animals killed by predators).

The short list of animals responsible for the majority of the deaths - Nile crocodiles, lions, elephants, and hippos - was not surprising. As magnificent as they are, they are also extremely dangerous, and their presence is simply a fact of life for people in poor, rural areas. What was remarkable about the collected reports, however, was that it was just one species which was responsible for the majority of reported attacks which concentrated in the southern part of the country - the Nile crocodile. According to the collected reports, Nile crocodiles were implicated in 66% of the fatalities, and most of these occurred along the Zambezi River while people were bathing, fishing, or otherwise undertaking some kind of daily activity in the water. They knew full well that there were crocodiles they, but, as the authors of the report state, these people may have been forced to place themselves at risk as they may not have been able to feed themselves or their families without centering their activities around crocodile habitats. These conflicts between human and crocodile have been going on for millions of years, though today poverty places some people at increased risk of a deadly encounter with predators like crocodiles.

(Interestingly, however, the retaliation against dangerous animals was reversed from what might be expected on the basis of this data. For every one person killed, two elephants or hippos were killed on average in retaliation, whereas the predator/human ratio was 0.6:1 for lions and 0.5:1 for crocodiles.)

Mozambique is not the only nation to harbor large, dangerous crocodylians. Northern Australia is well-known to be home to one of the largest reptiles on earth, the saltwater crocodile (affectionately known as "salties"), and the notorious predator continues to inspire sensational news stories and big-screen horror yarns. Unlike the situation in Mozambique, however, the majority of saltwater crocodile victims are not poor people risking their lives to put fish on the dinner table. In fact, as a review of Australian crocodile attacks published several years ago suggests, different causes may trigger crocodile attacks elsewhere in the world.

Looking at the pattern of 62 unprovoked attacks by wild saltwater crocodiles in Australia between 1971 and 2004, researchers David Caldicott, David Croser, Charlie Manolis, Grahame Webb, and Adam Britton found that saltwater crocodiles most regularly (81% of cases) attacked people swimming or wading in the water for recreation during the day. (Though out-of-water attacks did happen, and in two chilling exceptions crocodiles came entirely out of the water to grab victims from their tents.) Most of these victims were adult males about 31 years old, a trend consistent with the pattern of attacks made by American alligators, and in 29% of the cases the victims had been drinking alcohol before the attack - having a few beers before going swimming in croc country is obviously not a good idea.

Compared to one another, the number of attacks by saltwater crocodiles in Australia is dwarfed by the number of attacks by Nile crocodiles in Mozambique, even over a two year period. Even in a place where large predators are present the standard of living in an area can make a big difference in how often a person has to risk coming in contact with a creature that sees them as a food source. Nevertheless, the number of people killed by wild animals is relatively small compared to other causes of death. There are other greater risks in life - disease, traffic accidents, homicide, etc. - but the fear of being killed and eaten by something monstrous is an ancient terror which commands our attention whenever it happens. Part of the shock may even be because it is so rare - it happens just often enough to remind us of that not-too-distant-past when predators ruled the landscape.

Blasco, R., Rosell, J., Arsuaga, J., BermÃºdez de Castro, J., & Carbonell, E. (2010). The hunted hunter: the capture of a lion (Panthera leo fossilis) at the Gran Dolina site, Sierra de Atapuerca, Spain Journal of Archaeological Science DOI: 10.1016/j.jas.2010.03.010

Dunham, K., Ghiurghi, A., Cumbi, R., & Urbano, F. (2010). Human-wildlife conflict in Mozambique: a national perspective, with emphasis on wildlife attacks on humans Oryx, 44 (02) DOI: 10.1017/S003060530999086X

Caldicott DG, Croser D, Manolis C, Webb G, & Britton A (2005). Crocodile attack in Australia: an analysis of its incidence and review of the pathology and management of crocodilian attacks in general. Wilderness & environmental medicine, 16 (3), 143-59 PMID: 16209470

laelaps Fri, 05/21/2010 - 10:37

Tags

Eavesdropping lions zero-in on African wild dog calls

laelaps — Wed, 05 May 2010 17:22:24 +0000

Eavesdropping lions zero-in on African wild dog calls

African wild dogs (Lycaon pictus), photographed at the Bronx Zoo.

African wild dogs (Lycaon pictus) don't have it easy. Their taste for large mammalian prey puts them in competition with lions and spotted hyenas for both prey and living space, meaning that wild dogs regularly have their kills stolen or are even killed by other predators. In fact, the dogs may even be unintentionally attracting the attention of these other hunters.

Like other social carnivores, African wild dogs communicate with each other through body language and olfactory cues, but they also employ a variety of high-pitched vocalizations. Despite their social benefits, however, the chirps and twitterings of these canids also come with costs. Eavesdroppers can use the information gained through what they overhear to their own advantage, and this can be especially dangerous in the case of lions. They kill wild dogs if they can catch them, and by vocalizing wild dogs run the risk of calling attention to their dens, their kills, or even themselves.

That lions do hone in on African wild dog calls is supported by a recent paper by scientists Hugh Webster, John McNutt, and Karen McComb published in the journal Ethology. Over the course of several years the team ran a series of playback experiments in Botswana's Okavango Delta in which African wild dog calls ("twitters") were played in the vicinity of lions and spotted hyenas (as well as bird calls similar to the wild dog vocalizations as a control and spotted hyena whoops to see if there was a difference in reactions). In all the researchers observed the reactions of 51 lions from a minimum of six prides and 11 spotted hyenas from three clans, with one month between each experiment.

The results of the experiments showed a very clear pattern. In almost every case lions approached the direction of the speaker as soon as they heard an African wild dog call. They ignored the bird calls, and lions belonging to groups containing adult males were more likely to approach the speaker when they heard hyena whoops than those in groups without males, but almost every time the researchers played a wild dog call the lions approached regardless of their own group dynamics. The hyenas, on the other hand, showed clear signs that they heard the vocalizations, but they did not regularly approach. In fact, the researchers report that they sometimes observed hyenas resting in the vicinity of wild dogs, showing the dogs no nearly no attention until they set off to hunt.

Given these results, it would appear that (in the Okavango Delta, at least) African wild dogs vocalize at their own risk - if a lion hears a wild dog it will almost certainly approach. In one playback experiment not included in the final dataset, for example, a group of lions temporarily abandoned a buffalo kill when they heard the wild dog call, suggesting that their antagonism is driven more by competition and less by the desire to steal kills from the dogs. As the researchers note, the aggressive attitudes of the lions may explain why African wild dogs are rare in areas with denser lion populations, and it appears that hyenas are not as much of a threat to the canids as previously thought.

Given these risks it might be expected that African wild dogs would be less vocal or at least develop more cryptic vocalizations, but this does not appear to be the case. It would seem that the social benefits that come from their vocalizations outweigh the risk of detection by lions, and since African wild dogs are highly mobile predators they probably try to avoid areas frequented by lions as much as possible. As suitable habits for these predators shrink, however, lions and African wild dogs may be brought into closer contact, and understanding the interactions between these predators will be important for conservation efforts aimed at helping these predators.

Webster, H., McNutt, J., & McComb, K. (2010). Eavesdropping and Risk Assessment Between Lions, Spotted Hyenas and African Wild Dogs Ethology, 116 (3), 233-239 DOI: 10.1111/j.1439-0310.2009.01729.x

laelaps Wed, 05/05/2010 - 13:22

Tags

Great post, I'm a big fan of the wild dogs, but there's some tough competition where they make a living.

But it's nit-picky grammar time. From Merriam-Webster:

"The few commentators who have noticed hone in consider it to be a mistake for home in. It may have arisen from home in by the weakening of the \m\ sound to \n\ or may perhaps simply be due to the influence of hone. Though it seems to have established itself in American English (and mention in a British usage book suggests it is used in British English too), your use of it especially in writing is likely to be called a mistake. Home in or in figurative use zero in does nicely."

An interesting read. Here in Madikwe Game Reserve (North West Province, South Africa) I find that playing wild dog calls recorded at a kill are a sure fire way to attract spotted hyena and have used this method on many occasions in managing the spotted hyena population (I forget the exact number of time but certainly more than twenty). It also works well for black backed jackal.
Regards,
Declan Hofmeyr
Field Ecolgist
Madikwe Game Reserve.

Is it safe to assume that a large pack of wild dogs only has to fear lions, and that leopards, hyenas, and cheetahs, would avoid a confrontation with a large pack?

that a large pack of wild dogs only has to fear lions, and that leopards, hyenas, and cheetahs, would avoid a confrontation with a large pack?

I agree with declan "An interesting read. Here in Madikwe Game Reserve (North West Province, South Africa) I find that playing wild dog calls recorded at a kill are a sure fire way to attract spotted hyena and have used this method on many occasions in managing the spotted hyena population (I forget the exact number of time but certainly more than twenty). It also works well for black backed jackal.
Regards,
Declan Hofmeyr
Field Ecolgist
"

Beetle Mania

kthompson — Wed, 21 Apr 2010 13:11:46 +0000

Beetle Mania

Leave your infrared-laser tripped stationary camera to your dad, the whitetail hunting enthusiast, 'cause you're about learn what REAL wildlife photography is.
Will & Matt Burrard-Lucas just wrapped up their first (largely) successful photography expedition using their ingenious BeetleCam, a remote control camera ATV. The brothers have been professional nature photographers since 2004 but really set themselves apart from the wildlife photography hive when they strapped their DSLR camera to four tiny all-terrain tires, and camouflaged it.

After poppin' some major wheelies in the airport security line, they flew with the camera buggy to the Ruaha and Katavi National Parks in Tanzania. The national parks provided the BeetleCam with some amazing photo-opts while keeping the brothers at a safe distance which decreased their pant-wetting probability by like, 25%.
The first real test came when the team spotted some African elephants. The elephants proved to be a little harder capture than first assumed given their super sensitive hearing (their ears are REALLY big). But eventually, being the curious monsters they are, the elephants came over to check out the buggy on their own.

"What the H."

"Smells like peanuts. I love peanuts."

Next up: LIONS.
::Keep reading or you will regret it for the rest of your life.::

This is where the qualifier "largely" I used in the second sentence of this post comes into play. When you're driving a toy Hummer with an expensive duct-taped camera right into a pride of lions, you think "What could go wrong?" But then you're reminded that they're MF'ING LIONS when they grab your camera and take it into the bush to gnaw on it. But. Thankfully, the brothers were able to snag these incredible photos from the mangled camera body:

"Dude. It's cool. I've read Jose Cansenco's twitter page. I know how to handle perceived threats."

Absolutely terrifying.

So with camera one gone (a Canon 400D = $600), they had to think fast. The brothers' only option, other than to spend the rest of their African vacay at the hotel bar drinking tequila sunrises, was to strap their other camera (a Canon EOS 1D MK III = $6,000) onto to the ATV. No pressure.

Needless to say, the brothers steered clear of Africa's top predators. And I'm glad they did because it meant they were able to capture one of my favorite animals, the African Buffalo. Sure, they can be ferociously aggressive toward humans and other threatening animals, but a small motorized camera buggy didn't seem to bother them. In fact, they were pretty interested in the thing.

The BeetleCam Brothers will be making another trip to Africa later this year. Hopefully with lion repellent in tow. You should all, every single one of you, check out their blog, blog.burrard-lucas.com/ and subscribe to the RSS feed or email list so you won't miss a thing. And for more videos like this one, head over to the BeetleCam page.

BeetleCam Project Teaser from Will & Matt Burrard-Lucas on Vimeo.

Thanks so much to Will (of Will & Matt) for the great photos and information about the BeetleCam.

kthompson Wed, 04/21/2010 - 09:11

Tags

Will & Matt Burrard-Lucas

African buffalo

African Elephant

tanzania

Crumbs! I even loved the background music! What was it?

Wildlife photography should be about capturing the shot without screwing with the animals. If you want nostril shots go to the zoo. This idea is supreme arrogance. I hope every camera used this way gets eaten. (Bonus if the yuppy with the remote control gets eaten too).

I hate to say I agree with you Morne', because I did like the Pics, but I do agree with you.

I think the photos are great and I'll bet Ms. Lioness didn't mind the distraction nor did the Cape Buffalo.

Actually, Morne, I disagree with you. This beetlecam idea is one way of capturing wildlife shots by minimally "screwing" with the animals. If anything, it just peeks their curiosity and curious animals can make for great photo ops. There are so-called photographers out there that stage photos. Some even go as far as renting captive animals from poachers to photograph and even place starving, exhausted, animals against each other just to entice a stupid battle scene. Now THAT is screwing with animals. Like I said, this beetlecam minimally screws with animals. These photographers aren't harming the animals in any way. Love the pics!

@Minz and Frangipani. Being an African and having visited several African conservation areas instils a very strong conservation ethic. It is a privilege to visit any of these areas and the price is that you keep disturbance to the wildlife to an absolute minimum. What these Mavericks are doing flies in the face of all that, breaks the rules and regulations of the Katavi National Park where these photographs were taken and breaks all the ethics of wildlife photography. Just because a non-expert cannot discern an obvious impact on these animals does not mean none has occurred. As an example ask yourself if you would let your favourite dog chew on the lithium-ion batteries that most likely powers the devices the lions ended up chewing on.
This extract from an article web page by Juan Pons nicely summarizes exactly what a wildlife photographer should be doing:
(http://dpexperience.com/2010/04/23/wildlife-week-respect-wildlife/)
Â· First do no harm â The foundation of the wildlife photographers ethic. You must always ask yourself if the next action you are about to take will bring any harm to wildlife. Sometimes itâs very clear-cut, sometimes itâs a little more difficult to discern what consequences your actions make have. In any case you should always be considering the welfare of your subject first and foremost.
Â· Leave no trace behind â We have all heard this before. This means not to alter, modify disturb or destroy any habitat, food source or surroundings. Leave your location in the same state than you found it.
Â· Never harass wildlife â This means never to never taunt, bait or force an action out of your subject. Be patient! The most beautiful wildlife photographs result from natural behaviour. Never interfere with animals engaged in breeding, feeding, nesting, or caring for young. Learn the habits of your subjects; Respect and protect your subject, look for signs of stress. If you notice your subject is altering itâs behaviour as a result of your actions, stop. Learn to recognize wildlife alarm signals for the safety of both wildlife and yourself.

Wishing death on somebody because a lion chewed on their camera? Valuing the comfort of a beast over the life of a human? Think about what you say before spouting off in a fit of rage. Or perhaps you are just insane?

But just think about all the traffic this post has generated for Jose Cansenco's twitter page. It looks like the guy really needed something good to happen.

MornÃ©, I also disagree. You can't photograph wildlife without messing with them to some degree. Even the best zoom lens in the world sill requires getting close enough to the animals for them to be aware of you. This beetlecam is probably harassing the wildlife less than the average tourist on safari. And lions probably chew on much worse things than a camera (which wasn't "left behind" - the article states that the photographers picked it up as soon as it was safe to do so).

From my perspective, the operators of the beetlecam are following all the of Juan Pons' directives.

Jealous much Morne?

Look, teaching science without referring to the scientific method is like teaching math without referring to proofs.

MornÃ©, I also disagree.Wishing death on somebody because a lion chewed on their camera? Valuing the comfort of a beast over the life of a human.Leave no trace behind â We have all heard this before. This means not to alter, modify disturb or destroy any habitat, food source or surroundings. Leave your location in the same state than you found it.

sÃ¼per site her kese tavsiye ederim

thanks by admin

Why ligers are huge

razib — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 17:10:50 +0000

Why ligers are huge

Believe it or not, tigers are not the largest big cat. Ligers are (you might remember ligers from Napoleon Dynamite). Why? It has to do with the weirdness that occurs when you hybridize across two lineages which have been distinctive for millions of years, but not so long so as not to be able to produce viable offspring (in fact, many ligers are fertile as well). Here's the explanation:

Imprinted genes are under greater selective pressure than normal genes. This is because only one copy is active at a time. Any variations in that copy will be expressed. There is no "back-up copy" to mask its effects. As a result, imprinted genes evolve more rapidly than other genes. And imprinting patterns -- which genes are silenced in the eggs and sperm -- also evolve quickly. They can be quite different in closely related species.

Lions and tigers don't normally meet in nature. But they can get along very well in captivity, where they sometimes produce hybrid offspring. The offspring look different, depending on who the mother is. A male lion and a female tiger produce a liger - the biggest of the big cats. A male tiger and a female lion produce a tigon, a cat that is about the same size as its parents.

The difference in size and appearance between ligers and tigons is due in part to the parents' differently imprinted genes. Other animals can also hybridize, with similar results. For example, a horse and a donkey can produce a mule or a hinny.

Imprinting generally emerges due to competition between the interests of males and females within a given species because of complex social structures. What's good for father may not be good for mother. Lions live in prides, while tigers are relatively solitary. Apparently lionesses may mate with multiple males, so any given male has genes which tend to encourage growth in his own cubs as to as maximize his genes' share of finite resources in a competitive environment. In contrast, the female's genes tend to fight against this tendency, because she's equally related to all the potential cubs, and so wants to equally distribute resources as to maximize the number who might survive. Tigers are not subject to this dynamic. A tigress mates with one male, and so he is equally related to all the cubs. His genes would not want to "encourage" growth because there isn't competition between cubs from the male perspective, they're all of a piece. So the female does not need to evolve anti-growth imprinting defenses.

You bring a female tiger, who has no defenses against paternally inherited genes which tend to encourage growth, with a male lion who will contribute exactly those genes. And voilÃ , you get the liger, whose growth is a consequence of this asymmetry at the endpoint of different evolutionary histories.

razib Sun, 09/27/2009 - 13:10

Tags

Impressive beast though you wouldn't want one chasing you.

Has anyone determined which genes actually govern these effects?

does this effect occur when different human races produce offspring? i mean is their any diff in offspring between say, nigreian father/chinese mother, and chinese father/nigerian mother?

Just a note, tigers and lions don't share much range now, but up until a few hundred years ago they did. Asiatic lions are nearly extinct, a handful in India, I believe. So the comment above about not normally meeting in nature is only partially true. They probably did meet fairly frequently in the past, but don't now.

Makes me wonder if there wasn't some gene flow that we can't now observe, because the remnant populations are those that would have experienced it the least. Indian tigers are jungle creatures, while lions savanna.

lars

Biracial children with a white mother and black father have significantly higher IQ's than the reverse. Perhaps this is a similar dynamic. Like lionesses, black women are statistically much more likely to have multiple fathers of their kids, so the fathers genes would work harder to promote positive traits like IQ, whereas the mother's would work to "even things out".

It is interesting that the reproductive strategies of these two big cats are similar to the indigenous humans that locally habitate with them. The dangerous life of the savannah seems to promote the quantity over quality, and the seasonal temperate and harsh climates promote less offspring with higher quality across species - at least dominant species in the food chain like big cats and humans.

You wouldn't expect variation in human offspring to be the result of differences in imprinting. The sizes of the parents certainly will influence their offspring, but that is not what happens here. Generally speaking, the imprinting status of specific genes is similar across the species. In the case of the liger, you have lions upregulating the paternal allele while silencing the maternal. Since the tigers apparently do not imprint this loci, the maternal allele is expressed, and the offspring are larger.

A very similar effect has been shown in hybrid mice. Species such as Mus caroli are monandrous while Mus musculus females may mate with multiple males. Crossing a female M musculus and male M caroli you find the reverse of the liger situation. Mus caroli male's genomes do not show the same upregulation as male Mus musculus. However, the female Mus musculus still imprints those growth related genes. Comparing embryos and placenta of age matched Mus caroli x Mus musculus to normal Mus musculus x Mus musculus you see retarded growth of the embryo, and poor development of the maternal tissues.

LOLWUT? Is this a deliberate attempt to be inflammatory, or an exceptionally daft attempt at sociobiology? Even if social conditions in the US are currently such that many black women have children by multiple fathers... man, 400 years is a drop in the evolutionary bucket, even for a young genus like Homo. You also assume that intelligence is so simply inherited that a few imprinted genes would have a big effect, AND that IQ tests measure anything except one's ability to do well on IQ tests. Both of which range from doubtful to utter nonsense.

"Biracial children with a white mother and black father have significantly higher IQ's than the reverse. Perhaps this is a similar dynamic. Like lionesses, black women are statistically much more likely to have multiple fathers of their kids, so the fathers genes would work harder to promote positive traits like IQ, whereas the mother's would work to "even things out"."

Last time I checked, human beings were the same species. It's amazing how pseudo-scientists such as Lars/Hars can sit behind their computers, say untrue, unscientific, poorly thought out mumbo jumbo and call it fact. You should try publishing this somewhiere or just passing it amoungst your homogenous group of weak, unmasculine friends who get their kicks from degrading other races due to deep seeded racism, resentment, jealousy and fear.

That huge cat looks a bit like a (faded) leopard or jaguar as it does a lion or tiger.

dringle, i asked a question, i didn't call anything a fact.
'hars' supplies no source, so i'm not sure whether to believe him about his assertions about biracial kids. any objective study would probably probably require analyzing stats from adopted biracial kids where records are kept about their father and mother.

WTF Lars and Hars? Are you really that ridiculously inane to think that?? I'm hoping you were joking, inappropriate as it was.

Does the imprinting information really give us enough information to deduce things about the reproductive habits, or are these just-so stories? A few years ago, Vassar tried to take this size differential and the social structures and conclude the sexes of the parents, but got it backwards. Tigers have more variety of mates; lions may have a few mates in a pride, but they'll be the same the next year. Maybe competition within a litter trumps competition between litters, but it's not obvious.

Impressive beast though you wouldn't want one chasing you.

In spite of their size, ligers are said to be docile compared to their parents.

Tigons are exceedingly rare. I've heard that's because lionesses usually engage in rather aggressive "foreplay" which tigers find frustrating. Lions must find tigresses an easy score.

He's bewdeefull What a magnificiant creature. Where can I get one. How much would a Liger eat ?

Multiple mates per lioness?
According to Packer & Pusey ("Cooperation and competition within coalitions of male lions: kin selection or game theory?" 1982 nature 296, 740-2), male lions tend to respect ownership over, or consortship with oestrus females.
This suggests multiple mating partners per oestruscycle isn't common for lionesses..

Actually, lions and tigers still share overlapping natural ranges in the Gir Forest of India. There are, however, still no recorded instances of them breeding in the wild, potentially because they occupy distinct ecological niches within this overlapping range.

Conflict here might not be in equally dividing resources to cubs.
There is a major conflict in interest of male and female per se, a male is best of if his cubs grow fast and large, while a female can only spend a certain amount of resources per litter in order to obtain maximal lifetime reproductive succes. So all this additional cub-growth might well impose serious reduction in future reproduction for the female in question, while for the male this future reproduction mostly benefits from the same additional cub-growth.

Pig Fights Lion

zooillogix — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 19:35:25 +0000

Pig Fights Lion

That'll do pig. That'll do...

Thanks once again to Bill K.

zooillogix Sun, 11/02/2008 - 14:35

Tags

Wow...if I was that lion I would've just killed the pig. I'm sure getting headbutted over and over again can be irritating

This reminds me of when my small dogs head butts my Greater Swiss. He just takes it and tries to walk away. The small dog continues because she knows he isn't doing anything to stop it.
I suspect if the lioness wanted to kill the pig, she would. She may just not be hungry and sees no point in wasting future food by killing it now. Annoying as it may be to her "now", the next time the pig comes around asking for a fight, she might just give him one and eat him for dinner.

I don't know, I think it's also entirely possible that pig was giving her a run for her money. They have wicked tusks used just for the purpose of ruining someone's day, and I do'nt think the pig was headbutting her so much as running in and slashing with them. Still, if she wanted to kill him she more than likely could have.

I do like the lion's 'I'm ignoring you now' attempt. Standard cat behavior for 'I have lost control of this situation and know not what happens next.'

Predator FAIL

It's been a while since I saw the movie, but isn't this taken from/used in 'Born Free'...?

Brilliant Buenos Aires Zoo Ads

zooillogix — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 09:13:52 +0000

Brilliant Buenos Aires Zoo Ads

Imaginative but effective ads from the Buenos Aires Zoo. Via Toxel and thanks once again to Kevin Z.

"Get Much More for Less" Ads

"The Kangaroos Have Arrived" Ads

Many more below the fold

"Now We Are Open Late" Ads

"115 Years" Ads

Together Video (note that we cannot endorse the historical accuracy of this friendship...)

Argentine readers please take note: I still do not have a shot glass from this zoo and Labor Day is coming soon, which is a HUGE gift giving holiday up here in the States.

zooillogix Thu, 08/28/2008 - 05:13

Tags

I totally got all sobby over the video. I'm like that.