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15 Interesting Lion Facts

Lion

The largest and one of the fastest cats in the world native to the southern and eastern parts of Africa. Lions are known as social cats that are usually seen in groups known as “pride”. In each pride, there are almost one or two males and a large number of females, however, larger pride have around 40 members. The logic is very simple, life is quite easy in groups and it increases the chances of a successful hunt and can effectively provide protection of cubs. Let me list down some of the Interesting Lion Facts,

African Lions

Interesting Lion Facts

  • Lions are carnivorous animals and love to hunt on antelopes, zebras and wildebeests. Lioness is responsible for hunting though lions are strong and larger in size.
  • There are multiple scenarios where lions are acting like scavengers and they can even attack hyenas and steal their prey.
  • Lions can eat 40 pounds of meat and later snooze for more than 20 hours.
  • Lions back teeth is known as carnassials and they act like a pair of scissors that will chop meat and help them in swallowing without chewing.
  • Lions can be easily identified by their manes, the more dark and larger these “manes” are will show the strength of lions and other lions often avoid him. Lionesses react differently – they are attracted by the large and dark manes.
  • Lion and lioness like rubbing when they meet each other and during this process they exchange scents.
Lion
  • Lioness used to give 1-3 cubs each 2 years. There are spots seen on the cubs in starting that will disappear after a few years.
  • During the breeding of lion and tiger, new species named liger is created which has stripes like tiger, however, the colour of the fur is pale compared to tiger’s fur.
  • Lions have retractable claws that mean they could “hide” their claws during the play and avoid hurting each other.
  • Lions have a long tail which will help them in balancing while running, however, it can also be used to signalize various commands to other members of the pride.
  • Ther worst enemies of lions are Porcupine and the sharp quills can be stuck in lions jaws for the entire life.
  • Till two years, Lions can’t roar and when they learn to vocalize, their roars can be heard on the distance of up to 5 miles.
lion yawning
  • When young males join the pride, older ones kick them out of the pride and during this time they wander on their own. At this time, young lions are known as nomads. This will help them to fight and gain strength and later battle with other lions to take over a pride for themselves.
  • When new lion takes over the pride, it killed all cubs which are not of his own and during this process ¾ of cubs die at a young age.
  • Lions live up to 15 years in the wild and 25 to 30 years in the captivity. The species is listed as endangered animal species.

These are some of the interesting lion facts. Kindly share and do post your comments.

Written by Kan Dail