A Father Lion Is Not In The Mood For Games—It’s Time For A Lesson

Jul 08, 2020 by apost team

Cubs at the Zoo d’Amnéville in Amnéville, France are getting big enough that their parents have to start setting boundaries to keep them in line. Both Booba, the king of the pack at the zoo, and his lioness queen, Malindi, lay down the law with their feisty cubs in this video from May 2020. While it may look aggressive, the parents are actually using gentle play fighting techniques to demonstrate appropriate limits to their offspring, while also helping them burn off some steam.

The video starts with the three cubs getting a little too aggressive with their much larger father. He quickly gets them back in line with a lightning-fast charge, which scatters the cubs across their enclosure. Now that he's made it clear to the cubs who is the real king of the jungle, the victorious elder then saunters off, leaving the youngsters to entertain themselves. Their mother, Malindi, continues interacting with the three energetic youngsters, taking it in turn to play both the hunter and the prey.

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As we continue to watch the video of the lions, the youngsters slowly morph into adolescents, complete with the beginnings of fuzzy manes. Bongo, Komga, and Gandor keep their playful spirits even as they grow more physically mature though, and we can see them swatting playfully at their father and chasing their patient mother's tail. It is clear that any fighting remains fun-loving rather than serious, as all the animals look relaxed in each other's company and snooze in-between games.

From the beginning to the end, throughout the course of the video, the feline parents are able to set clear boundaries through play fighting and chasing. While it can look startling at first, it soon becomes clear even to a casual observer that these fights are not serious, and that in fact the lion parents are simply instinctively teaching their cubs valuable skills that would have served them well in the wild. Booba and Malindi make excellent lion parents and are raising their cubs to have the appropriate hunter instincts for their species, though they likely won't ever truly need to use them. 

Have you ever seen lion parents teach their cubs a lesson? Let us know in the comments and be sure to pass this article along to your friends and family!