Ok, so you may have noticed that I have devoted a lot of my blog space to Xena, the Greatest Cheetah in world. However, we do have many other cheetahs and althouh they are not as great as Xena they still deserve some attention. So I thought I would start introducing you to some of our other resident cats.
The cats you see in the pic above are collectively known as the Four Scientists - the menacing looking charactor to the right is Livingston, next to him is Fossie, the cat at his feet with the big white tip at the end of his tail is Darwin and finally we have Mendel at the back. Ok, so not all of those names belong to Scientists but the name has a good ring to it!
The Scientists live in a 5 hectare pen in Bellebenno which means they have to suffer being right next door to 17 beautifull female cheetahs that they can't get too! Also, much to their annoyance the boys are on a diet at the moment as they had to be housed in a smaller pen whilst Emma, Minja and Jacomina used their pen for their training (see previous blog). This meant we couldn't exercise them as much as they were used to - the result was four very chubby scientists! So for the last couple of weeks their food has been halved and they are being made to really earn their food by running the entire length of their pen. Their new regime is working and they are slowly regaining their figures.
The four boys get on famously for most of the time; the exceptions are when it comes down to food and women! Fossie unfortunately ended up with a swollen eye after coming to blows with his coalition mates whilst competing over the attention of Rosy and Misty who had just returned from NamibRand and were being kept in the holding pen directly opposite them. He looked pretty sorry for himself for a while but he soon made a full recovery and was back to scrapping for food at the next feed.
Mendel is definitely the boss closely followed by Livingston who is the one scientist who really likes to give his keepers a hard time by acting like a right punk, coming as close as he can and hissing and spitting in their faces. Darwin is the most relaxed and often just lies down and watches the others getting all worked up trying to prove how macho they are.
So, thats the Scientists......just another 47 cats to go!
Mendel is definitely the boss closely followed by Livingston who is the one scientist who really likes to give his keepers a hard time by acting like a right punk, coming as close as he can and hissing and spitting in their faces. Darwin is the most relaxed and often just lies down and watches the others getting all worked up trying to prove how macho they are.
So, thats the Scientists......just another 47 cats to go!
2 comments:
FYI - Livingston was originally Roland and then got named David by a sponsor. I still haven't forgiven Phil for changing Rolands name. I will forgive the sponsor because it involved 5000$.
aha, that explains the mysterious 'David' cheetah name sign I found at the back of a cuboard - even Bruce had no idea about it. However, there is no way on earth I am calling him David, Livingston is his name in the records and its staying that way!
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