Meet our lion cubs
We are very excited to have four rare Asiatic lion cubs at Paignton Zoo, born on Tuesday 15th May 2012 to mother Indu and father Mwamba. Try to spot them in their enclosure soon!
The cubs have recently been to the vet - or rather, the vet has been to them! Our latest arrivals were due for their first routine vaccinations. To find out how to vaccinate a lion cub and read the full story click here.
Our lion cubs are now over 4 months old. They were introduced to solids at about 2 months and are showing a very healthy appetite – they are getting bigger every day! They will continue to suckle milk until they are 6 months old.
The cubs are becoming more and more adventurous, during the day they can be seen playing, sleeping and suckling.
Visitors have helped name the cubs and raised £702.53 for Paignton Zoo's conservation work in the process. People voted for their favourite names by putting money into special collecting boxes labelled with a shortlist of names chosen by zoo keepers.
Paignton Zoo spokesperson Phil Knowling said: “We made a special collecting box with a slot for each name. People voted by making a donation. It meant that people who had seen the cubs were able to vote.”
The choice of girls’ names were:
Amaris – child of the moon (the name of mother Indu means moon)
Karishma – miracle
Maliya – a place name
Rashmi – moon beam
Zarina – gold
The winning girls’ names are Zarina and Maliya.
The choice of male names were:
Inesh – strong king
Jari – a sacred fig tree, but it also means powerful, brave
Lathi – a form of ancient martial art using sticks
Palash – flame of the forest tree
Sabal – with strength
The winning boys’ names are Jari and Sabal.
Keep checking this page for further updates and find some useful links below:
