ANIMALS

Lioness Adopts Orphaned Leopard Cub After Losing Her Own Cubs Making A Heartwarming Story

Researchers in Tanzania’s Serengeti National Park made an interesting discovery – a lioness that seemed to have adopted a baby leopard. This is similar to an incident that occurred in India’s Gir National Park in December 2018, where a small male cub, around 2 months old, was cared for by a lioness who fed him with prey she had killed. The lioness also played with her own two cubs, who were around the same age as the leopard cub. This unusual case of inter-species fostering has left researchers puzzled and is considered “bizarre” in the journal Ecosphere. From an evolutionary perspective, it’s strange for a lioness to take care of another animal’s young.

More info: panthera.org

It’s rare to see animals adopting offspring from another species, and it’s even more unusual for them to adopt a competitor’s young. However, a wild lioness named Nosikitok came across a lone kitten near her cubs’ den, and surprisingly, they are around the same age when this encounter occurred.

The lioness protects the young leopard as if it were her own cub. It’s suspected that the lioness’ own cubs might be deceased because they haven’t been seen for a while. While lions are known to care for each other’s cubs, other big cat species’ adults and cubs can be hostile toward each other. This is likely a unique and rare event.

Experts think the ideal scenario would be for the leopard to reunite with his mother, as they are uncertain how the Nosikitok pride will react to the new arrival.

“It’s likely that she came into touch with this leopard youngster which she adopted before her parental hormones went off,” says Sarah Durant of the London Zoological Society.

No one knows for sure if the lioness will fully accept the baby leopard. Let’s hope that the lioness will take care of the young leopard until it grows up.

Dr. Luke Hunter, the president, and chief conservation officer, says this is a unique situation that will be fascinating to observe as it develops.

ANIMALS

Amazing Video of Unseen Ocean Creatures in the Ningaloo Canyons

The Schmidt Ocean Institute recently explored the Ningaloo Canyons on the western coast of Australia using a robotic underwater vehicle called the ROV Sebastian. Check out the amazing video of what they discovered in the deep parts of the Indian Ocean.

More info: Youtube

ANIMALS

These Pics Are Art and the Artists Are Insects

Flying insects move so quickly that they are hard to follow, but new technology and some smart ideas have helped Spanish photographer Xavi Bou do just that. After spending 10 years focusing on birds in flight for his Ornithographies project, he turned his attention to insects.

For Entomographies, he uses high-speed video footage taken by Adrian Smith, an insect expert at North Carolina State University, to study and record how insects move. Bou then picks multiple frames and combines them into single images that show the fast movements of one or more insects through space and time.

With Smith’s help, Bou has captured the aerial tricks of wasps, the jumps of leafhoppers, and the fluttering of butterflies in amazing detail. He hopes that by doing this, he can make people more aware of the decline in important insect populations around the world.

1. Zebra longwing

This butterfly, which is common in many areas of the Americas, really fits its name. It can fly very high with just a few flaps of its large wings.