Zoos that keep father cats with cubs?

Jess_Greenwood

Jess_Greenwood

Member
Hi everyone. :)

I hope this is the right section as I couldn't see where else it would go. Apologies to anyone who is a member of Zoo Keepers Europe as they will have already seen my post on there

Myself and a couple of other researchers are building a research project which looks at the relationships between felid fathers that are kept with their cubs instead of being separated.

I'm just looking for the names of any zoos (worldwide) that anyone knows/thinks have currently/previously kept any felid males in with their cubs. We won't be taking any further action yet, I'm just trying to get a list of collections together. :)

Thanks in advance.
 
At what point do you talk about separation? Do you mean that the father is kept with the parents at any point before adulthood, but not necessarily at all times? For lions it's not uncommon I believe to have the cubs live with their father. I think it's also been done with tigers, I believe at Beekse Bergen, but I don't know at what age.
 
I know that at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park, mother Oshana gave birth to 4 cubs sired by Izu. They had displayed the pride together when the cubs were around 4 months old. Two of the cubs, Ernest and Miss Ellen, are now the resident lions at the San Diego Zoo and are close to 6 years old :)
 
Sorry I should have specified but I can't edit the original post, it's for solitary cats so excluding lions.

It can be the father present at any time before adulthood, so I know some zoos will separate after birth and reintroduce later on. Basically so that the father is around for the rearing, because obviously this is unnatural for solitary species, which is what makes it so interesting to research.

We are interested in looking at the kind of interactions they have with their offspring because in the wild the mother would do all rearing independently.
 
Jess_Greenwood said:
Sorry I should have specified but I can't edit the original post, it's for solitary cats so excluding lions.

It can be the father present at any time before adulthood, so I know some zoos will separate after birth and reintroduce later on. Basically so that the father is around for the rearing, because obviously this is unnatural for solitary species, which is what makes it so interesting to research.

We are interested in looking at the kind of interactions they have with their offspring because in the wild the mother would do all rearing independently.
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Thanks for the clarification. You do know that some solitary species, I believe tigers in particular, have been found to have some sort of father-child interaction on rare occasions in the wild.

I do recall that in Gaiazoo they have a large group of lynx (breeding pair + 8 or so offspring), I suspect they introduced the cubs to the group before adulthood but you'd need to get confirmation from the park itself as I'm not sure.
 
Jarne said:
Thanks for the clarification. You do know that some solitary species, I believe tigers in particular, have been found to have some sort of father-child interaction on rare occasions in the wild.

I do recall that in Gaiazoo they have a large group of lynx (breeding pair + 8 or so offspring), I suspect they introduced the cubs to the group before adulthood but you'd need to get confirmation from the park itself as I'm not sure.
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Absolutely! It doesn't seem uncommon in Europe for the male to be present, I just completed research on a snow leopard family where the male was present with the cub from the cub being aged about two months. He played with the cub, slept with him, all kinds of paternal behaviour. And yet there is so little research on it.

You are right about Gaia zoo, one of their keepers got in touch with me about the lynxes. At this stage I'm just 'putting the feelers out' so it doesn't matter if anyone says a collection that later turns out to be incorrect. Any information is a great help to me and much appreciated.
 
The Sumatran tiger pair at Chester, Fabi and Kirana, raised 2 litters of cubs without being separated in 2011 and 2013. Fabi was present when Kirana gave birth to the second litter in their indoor den (
) but she reared both litters under a wooden climbing structure in the outdoor enclosure. I think Fabi kept out of the way most of the time
Kirana and one of her daughters are still at the zoo, Fabi was transferred to Paignton where he died recently. He fathered a cub there, but I am not sure when he was introduced to mother and cub.
 
It is indeed a fascinating subject, especially when it comes to welfare. Does it induces reduces stress? Higher or lower stereotypical behaviors? I know a case of brown bears where the presence of two cubs drastically reduced stereotypical behavior in both parents, even though they are traditionally seen as solitary.

In general I believe that much more research is needed on the social structures in which animals are kept, especially for semi-social or solitary species like rhino, orang-utan, felids, bears, male elephants, male giraffe, .... We've just scratched the surface, and I suspect we will discover both pleasant and less pleasant things about the husbandry-methods we sometimes see as normal.
 
Jess_Greenwood said:
Sorry I should have specified but I can't edit the original post, it's for solitary cats so excluding lions.

It can be the father present at any time before adulthood, so I know some zoos will separate after birth and reintroduce later on. Basically so that the father is around for the rearing, because obviously this is unnatural for solitary species, which is what makes it so interesting to research.

We are interested in looking at the kind of interactions they have with their offspring because in the wild the mother would do all rearing independently.
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Ah I see what you mean, I’ll keep a lookout for any cases of felids besides lions involved in interaction or rearing of their young :)
 
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Dublin Zoo allowed their male Sumatran tiger to remain with his 1.1 cubs:

The cubs formed a strong bond with both their father, Kepala, and mother, Sigra. Whilst, traditionally male Sumatran Tigers are solitary creatures, Kepala has taken an active role in the cub’s upbringing and unusually the family enjoy sleeping together at night time alongside each other.

Dublin Zoo announces names for their critically-endangered Sumatran tiger cubs


London Zoo's male Sumatran tiger was also present at the birth of his cubs. He's seen in this video at 0.23 seconds:

Keepers capture the moment Sumatran tigers are born at London Zoo
 
I believe ZooAmerica kept their litter of Canada lynx cubs in the exhibit with mom and dad from birth.
 
Only place I have seen it is Le Parc Des Felins, where it is surprisingly common. Could be the larger-than-usual enclosure sizes makes it easier (fathers can get away from cubs when they want to). Here is one example of the jaguars I photographed there.
full
 
Hi! In Karlsruhe zoo we had our litter of Chinese Leopards (born 2010) together with both parent animals. Same goes with our snowleopard cubs from 2012 and 2015.

During feeding time, the male was seperated from the female with its cubs, apart from that the animals were all time together.
 
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