i had some time yesterday before the 4:05 baseball game, so why not got ot the national zoo, it's free and an easy metro ride away. where i saw something i never knew happened, a swimming lion, swimming for pleasure, and according to a nikonist shooting away by me, this juvenile lion named aslan swims frequently, and has his own water toy, an old beer keg, even though the other 3 males, his father and 2 brothers never swim. i knew tigers swam regularly, have seen them doing this at disney, but never ever have i heard of a lion swimming. and the males were all pretty active, even though it was sunny, warm and midday. disney needs to hire these animatronic engineers away from the smithsonian, they have a much better designed lion kitty looks happy to me dad was up and frequently moving a little brotherly affection the ladies were more disney like, mostly just laying around in the sun, they have 10 lions, 1 adult male, 2 adult females, that are sisters, and his offspring, 3 males and 3 females.
Great series! ; I agree, it would be awesome if Disney found a way to make their lions more active! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Wow. ; Great shots! Yeah I'm thinking Disney has to think safety first, so the older rescue lions get dibs on Kilimanjaro. ; Were the theming a little different, the Disney lions could have access to a different, more secure habitat. ; You know they were thinking Lion King when they placed the lion habitat way up above eye level.
Very cool that you got to see this. There's something about the big cats that just fascinates. Unfortunately, that much activity is all too rare in captive cats. Or any cat. Heck, if I think back to our pet cats while growing up, they were either sleeping in the house, or outside sleeping in the shade. Maybe they were auditioning for a spot at Disney. Erich
Very cool shots Gary - and nice to see the lions enjoying the water. ; From what I know of lions, they generally don't 'like' water, but will deal with it. ; However, it depends on where the lions live. ; For example, there are lions living in Botswana's flood plains that are flooded a good portion of the year, and those lions have adapted to living in the water for months on end, wading or swimming. ; Amazing how lions, or any animals, adapt and evolve to their habitat. ; Another example are the famous (infamous) lions of Tsavo...due to the thorny scraping bush of that part of the continent, the male lions there do not grow manes anymore...perfectly adapted to living in such environs.
