Today is World Lion Day 🦁
Lions live in prides that can have more than 15 members. The mothers teach the young the necessary survival skills. Being sociable beings, they form strong bonds and have various forms of communication.
Common gestures such as head rubbing and licking give them pleasure and have been compared to primate grooming. They also have a wide repertoire of vocalizations that includes hissing, wincing, coughing, meowing, grunting, roaring, and barking. Their roar can be heard 8 km away, making them the cats with the loudest roar.
They have highly developed senses. They can see at night, they have a good sense of smell and hearing; they can hear prey a mile away and turn their ears in the direction a specific sound is coming from. Touch is also very important for communication between members of a pack.
However, there are many lions that live in captivity; It is estimated that, only in South Africa, between 8,000 and 12,000 lions live in such a situation.
To entertain humans in circuses, zoos or tourist activities, they are captured from the wild or born in captivity and are separated from their mothers when they are still very young for their mothers to become pregnant again shortly after.
Among the tourist activities to which lions are most exposed is “canned hunting”, in which lions are placed in small spaces where hunters have zero chance of missing the target.
We have the power to end the use of animals for entertainment by stopping zoos, aquariums, and any captive animal show.
