dragon(ele)nerd
Well-Known Member
Which he isn't doing a very good job of getting people's respect only young kids at the most,
Zion Wildlife Gardens Lion Man
- Thread starter MARK
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Which he isn't doing a very good job of getting people's respect only young kids at the most,
I did a tour of Zion Gardens about six months ago. At $60 for a 30 min guided tour it wasn't cheap. and any sort of hands on experience will set you back several hundred. Plus for about the price of a return flight to Africa to see lions in the wild ($3500) you can spend a night in Craig's house which incorporates a lion cage on the ground floor.
As has been said the lion cages remind one of the old style lion pens I remember at Auckland Zoo in the '70s.
What amused me most though was the "informative" talk by the guide. With details to remember about only a couple of speices one would think the park would take the trouble to get them right.
I was told that lions only live in Africa in the wild (Indian Gir forrest???)
Lions live in prides that are made up of related members, and thus inbreeding is one of the reasons for the decline in the wild.
Some male lions choose to leave the pride when they grow a mane (not their choice however)
Male lions can't hunt for themselves, so rely on lionesses to hunt for them. Males who leave the pride have to find their own females and form a new pride (have to be quick before they starve)
Male lions spend their time asleep, and get the females to do the hunting. When the females have made a kill they send for the males who arrive and eat first (a lion telegraph maybe)
When lions hunt several lionesses will hide while the others circle around and drive the game towards the hidden hunters (must have got this off Disney)
Lions will look after and protect all cubs, even if they aren't the parents.
However many of the visitors think tigers come from Africa so I suppose the guide talk is interesting to them.
As has been said the lion cages remind one of the old style lion pens I remember at Auckland Zoo in the '70s.
What amused me most though was the "informative" talk by the guide. With details to remember about only a couple of speices one would think the park would take the trouble to get them right.
I was told that lions only live in Africa in the wild (Indian Gir forrest???)
Lions live in prides that are made up of related members, and thus inbreeding is one of the reasons for the decline in the wild.
Some male lions choose to leave the pride when they grow a mane (not their choice however)
Male lions can't hunt for themselves, so rely on lionesses to hunt for them. Males who leave the pride have to find their own females and form a new pride (have to be quick before they starve)
Male lions spend their time asleep, and get the females to do the hunting. When the females have made a kill they send for the males who arrive and eat first (a lion telegraph maybe)
When lions hunt several lionesses will hide while the others circle around and drive the game towards the hidden hunters (must have got this off Disney)
Lions will look after and protect all cubs, even if they aren't the parents.
However many of the visitors think tigers come from Africa so I suppose the guide talk is interesting to them.
dragon(ele)nerd
Well-Known Member
Nice review, though I'm surprised of some of the things that were told on the tour, then again many things surprise you when you look really deep into a particular species, e.g the time in year 5 I saw footage of a hippo eating meat!! So I can't really rebut.
I must of also put my sights a little high the last episode i saw ( I think about one and a half years ago) it looked like the new exhibits were going to be extremly exotic, ah well, all and all I'm not one who knows best,
I must of also put my sights a little high the last episode i saw ( I think about one and a half years ago) it looked like the new exhibits were going to be extremly exotic, ah well, all and all I'm not one who knows best,
Hi Kiwipo,
While I agree that some of the things that go on at Zion are certainly 'different' (I'm surprised he hasn't been killed yet, to be honest).
You might like to know that during a trip to the Serengeti last year, I was lucky enough to see a kill by lions. And the majority of the lionesses chased the topi from behind, straight into the head lioness, who was hiding in grass, and who popped up and very simply grabbed the antelope.
So perhaps this part of the talk is true?
torie
Well-Known Member
watching big cat diary they did the sme thing, some lions in safari parks are also learning to hid n the ditches along the sides of the dirt roads that run through the park, they chase prey towards these ditches where they stumble and fal and are caught by the hiden lions.
lons mothers from the same pride wil also creche their young togher to raise them and often nurse cubs from other mothers in their prides
so some aspects of their talk are actaully true but no idea where they came up with mot of that stuff
Lions have been a passion and interest of mine for many years. I've read every book I can find by lion researchers, and travelled to Africa four times where I was lucky enough to work as a volunteer on a lion research project in South Africa.
Lions do wait in hiding for game that might be scared their way by other lions, however there is no evidence to suggest this is preplanned. Rather it seems some lions prefer to lie down and let others do the running, either joining in when they prey is caught, or acting opportunistely if something runs their way. Lots of times lions do wait in hiding and game ends up being chased their way to their advantage. a lot more times it runs the other way and doesn't get caught.
According to experienced researchers the myth of lions waiting in ambush came about because a number of kills had bene seen where lions were hidden along the route the aminals fled.
As for lions looking after each others cubs, very true amongst lionesses in the pride, and the pride males also let cubs feed and will protect them to some extent. But the tlak would have been better if he had made this clearer.
I'm not posting this to be a knowall, but simply to point out the correct info is easily available, and if I was running a zoo that concentrated on just a few speices I'd be making sure my guides had the correct information.
But I do know it's hard to moniter what guides say, especially when there are quite a few volunteer guides.
Lions do wait in hiding for game that might be scared their way by other lions, however there is no evidence to suggest this is preplanned. Rather it seems some lions prefer to lie down and let others do the running, either joining in when they prey is caught, or acting opportunistely if something runs their way. Lots of times lions do wait in hiding and game ends up being chased their way to their advantage. a lot more times it runs the other way and doesn't get caught.
According to experienced researchers the myth of lions waiting in ambush came about because a number of kills had bene seen where lions were hidden along the route the aminals fled.
As for lions looking after each others cubs, very true amongst lionesses in the pride, and the pride males also let cubs feed and will protect them to some extent. But the tlak would have been better if he had made this clearer.
I'm not posting this to be a knowall, but simply to point out the correct info is easily available, and if I was running a zoo that concentrated on just a few speices I'd be making sure my guides had the correct information.
But I do know it's hard to moniter what guides say, especially when there are quite a few volunteer guides.
Very true that osme lions do that, and proves lions can learn hunting techniques from experience. But they don't get taught to ambush prey as a matter of course. In areas of thick bush, such as South Africa, they are quite good at ambushing prey, often just lying up in the bush until something wanders by.
As for mothers looking after cubs not their own, thats quite natural in prides. But the guides talk didn't make this clear, listening to him one would think that any lion will look after any cub no matter where it came from, whereas lions of both sexes will usually kill strange cubs.
The biggest blunder I thought was the statement that male lions can't hunt for themselves, and when they leave their parent pride they have to find females to provide them with food.
How they manage to live in the period between leaving their own pride, and taking over another, he didn't say.
As for mothers looking after cubs not their own, thats quite natural in prides. But the guides talk didn't make this clear, listening to him one would think that any lion will look after any cub no matter where it came from, whereas lions of both sexes will usually kill strange cubs.
The biggest blunder I thought was the statement that male lions can't hunt for themselves, and when they leave their parent pride they have to find females to provide them with food.
How they manage to live in the period between leaving their own pride, and taking over another, he didn't say.
dragon(ele)nerd
Well-Known Member
wow, what a honour it would be to have an experince amongst a creature like a Lion and espicially on home turf!
, hmmm, concerning males Lions what about ones that don't particularly belong to one pride,? I'm sure they can hunt for themselves,..
There has also been footage I have seen that the Male is needed because he apparently posses strength that the Lioness don't have, ( they were trying to take down a giraffe)
, hmmm, concerning males Lions what about ones that don't particularly belong to one pride,? I'm sure they can hunt for themselves,..
There has also been footage I have seen that the Male is needed because he apparently posses strength that the Lioness don't have, ( they were trying to take down a giraffe)
As I mentioned above, most male lions can hunt for themselves. those that can't simply starve to death after being driven out of the pride by the pride males.
Pride males often hunt too, either by themselves or with the females. However usually they force their way onto a kill made by the lionesses, or even steal kills from other predators such as cheetahs, leopards or hyenas.
Life isn't as easy in the wild as it is in zoos for male lions. They have a couple of years of pride life before being driven out, if they are lucky they will team up with one or two other males and succesfully hint together for a few more years, and when close to their prime they might be able to take over a pride by running off or killing the pride males.
then they get another few years of pride life, during which they have to constantly patrol their territory, drive off any other males intruding, mate with as many females as they can, before they too have a more powerful coalition of males turn up to take the pride over. If they are lucky they will survive this encounter, but only to spend the rest of their days hunting for themselves again. Few male lions die of old age. But in the wild few animals of any species except the biggest like elephants die of old age.
Pride males often hunt too, either by themselves or with the females. However usually they force their way onto a kill made by the lionesses, or even steal kills from other predators such as cheetahs, leopards or hyenas.
Life isn't as easy in the wild as it is in zoos for male lions. They have a couple of years of pride life before being driven out, if they are lucky they will team up with one or two other males and succesfully hint together for a few more years, and when close to their prime they might be able to take over a pride by running off or killing the pride males.
then they get another few years of pride life, during which they have to constantly patrol their territory, drive off any other males intruding, mate with as many females as they can, before they too have a more powerful coalition of males turn up to take the pride over. If they are lucky they will survive this encounter, but only to spend the rest of their days hunting for themselves again. Few male lions die of old age. But in the wild few animals of any species except the biggest like elephants die of old age.
NZ Jeremy
Well-Known Member
I saw this on a show (with computer graphic enhancement) narrated by David Attenborough who I personally would trust implicitly... That show propagated that it was planned...
However from reading about lions also, I don't believe they would have the smarts to co-ordinate such a hunt, they are very brutish thugs really...
Can we shed some light on this..? Maybe a few links..?
P.S. The guide we had made a few mistakes but none this blatant, more minor stuff only zoo geeks (or is that freaks) would know...
dragon(ele)nerd
Well-Known Member
Guys usually have it the worst in the animal kingdom! 
I too saw the show by Attenborough, and it was very interesting. However it was only an analysis of one hunt if I remeber correctly. Which means they may have filmed a number of hunts to get the one they wanted to portray.
Attenborough is a very experienced animal film producer who I admire greatly, but he covers every singel living thing whether it walks, swims flies of grows in the ground.
Researchers like Pieter Katt and George Schaller have spent at least ten years each observing only lions in the wild and they say as a rule lions do not hunt by preconcieved ambush.
Schaller wrote a book :The African lion, a predator prey relationship" where he said ambushes when they occurred were more the result of a large group of lions heading out over a large area and all lieing low until one made her move, and if the prey was chased towards others then they took the opportunity.
Only about one in five lion hunts actually results in a kill, and some lionessses are better at catching prey than others. I'm sure you have seen plenty of footage on TV where the prey manages to outrun the lion, or even fight her off. Have you seem the incredible video on the lions who chase a buffalo calf into a river, pull it out of th jaws of a crocodile only to have the buffalo heard come back to rescue the calf?
Attenborough is a very experienced animal film producer who I admire greatly, but he covers every singel living thing whether it walks, swims flies of grows in the ground.
Researchers like Pieter Katt and George Schaller have spent at least ten years each observing only lions in the wild and they say as a rule lions do not hunt by preconcieved ambush.
Schaller wrote a book :The African lion, a predator prey relationship" where he said ambushes when they occurred were more the result of a large group of lions heading out over a large area and all lieing low until one made her move, and if the prey was chased towards others then they took the opportunity.
Only about one in five lion hunts actually results in a kill, and some lionessses are better at catching prey than others. I'm sure you have seen plenty of footage on TV where the prey manages to outrun the lion, or even fight her off. Have you seem the incredible video on the lions who chase a buffalo calf into a river, pull it out of th jaws of a crocodile only to have the buffalo heard come back to rescue the calf?
found this today, about volunteers/prospective employees moving to NZ when promised work at Zion but then being refused upon arrival (I posted it in this thread rather than the "Lion Man Losing Licence" because the topic has been raised on this thread before)...
New Zealand Reality TV: Lion Park Workers Upset Over Broken Promises
New Zealand Reality TV: Lion Park Workers Upset Over Broken Promises
there are links on the page too, and also comments left by users
I know that this is an old posting
but can anyone tell me what has happened at Zion
last year while staying with a family member I visited the place soon after the keeper was killed and was told by one of the keepers that they had brought in a zoo consultant to help the place.
and then last week when I asked about it I was told that the consultant had gone and the place was only just hanging in there.
is there any one that can shed light on this?
but can anyone tell me what has happened at Zion
last year while staying with a family member I visited the place soon after the keeper was killed and was told by one of the keepers that they had brought in a zoo consultant to help the place.
and then last week when I asked about it I was told that the consultant had gone and the place was only just hanging in there.
is there any one that can shed light on this?
You could check their website, as its more or less up to date.
They are still operating tours, however the hands on encounters with big cats have finished, and a far as I know the staff are no longer allowed to have hands on with the adult cats.
The managment of the park were up in court recently charged over the death of the keeper mauled by the tiger.
Im not sure how the place keeps going as the food bill for the cat must be huge, but they still seem to attract plenty of people to do the tours.
The staff turnover seems quite high though, and there dont' seem to be too many happy ex staff members.
They are still operating tours, however the hands on encounters with big cats have finished, and a far as I know the staff are no longer allowed to have hands on with the adult cats.
The managment of the park were up in court recently charged over the death of the keeper mauled by the tiger.
Im not sure how the place keeps going as the food bill for the cat must be huge, but they still seem to attract plenty of people to do the tours.
The staff turnover seems quite high though, and there dont' seem to be too many happy ex staff members.
Thanks
Kiwipro
I did check it out but soon saw that it was written by the zion park so was a bit one sideed although I did find out the consultants name. Tim Husband I googled it and was able to contact him. he's now the Curator of Bali Safari and Marine park. but he wouldn't or didn't want to comment on Zion. just said that they are working hard to keep it afloat.
Kiwipro
I did check it out but soon saw that it was written by the zion park so was a bit one sideed although I did find out the consultants name. Tim Husband I googled it and was able to contact him. he's now the Curator of Bali Safari and Marine park. but he wouldn't or didn't want to comment on Zion. just said that they are working hard to keep it afloat.
thats interesting, I was keen on doing some vollie work there, as I like lions and was a vollie at Orana Park for a while. But despite my love of lions I was warned off by a couple of former workers who told me just to stay away.
Orana park vollie life was great, I hope to return one day.
Orana park vollie life was great, I hope to return one day.
abused volunteers
I have a co-worker that was a volunteer there for four months. She was hired at Zion Wildlife gardens, sold all her possessions, flew to NZ, and then was told there really was not a job for her. Afterwards she was told by staff there that she was one in a long line of people this happened to. I would have looked at legal action for this shameless practice.
Craig Busch's mindless supporters are still busily raising money for him. I hope it never comes down to him being involved in that "train wreck" again.
I have a co-worker that was a volunteer there for four months. She was hired at Zion Wildlife gardens, sold all her possessions, flew to NZ, and then was told there really was not a job for her. Afterwards she was told by staff there that she was one in a long line of people this happened to. I would have looked at legal action for this shameless practice.
Craig Busch's mindless supporters are still busily raising money for him. I hope it never comes down to him being involved in that "train wreck" again.