Natural History

Posted in wildlife | Tagged leopard, leopard/lion hybrid, leopon, Lion, lion/leopard hybrid, Panthera hybrid | 9 Comments

9 Responses

1. on February 27, 2011 at 2:22 pm Stephanie Briggs

   LOL – are you sure that isn’t a photoshop job? Some male lions, when they’re younger, have a smaller ruff like that. :)

   
   
   • on February 27, 2011 at 2:46 pm retrieverman

     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopon

     
     
     • on February 28, 2011 at 2:19 pm Stephanie Briggs

       Thanks. Sounds like a big-cat version of a mule.

       
       
   • on February 28, 2011 at 12:46 am Pai

     There are other photos of this type of Hybrid floating around online, though this one has very distinct spots compared to most, it seems.

     
     
2. on February 27, 2011 at 4:14 pm Christopher@Borderwars

   Gorgeous

   
   
3. on March 21, 2012 at 12:32 am kittenz

   I’m pretty sure this one is a leopon. The photos I’ve seen of confirmed jaglions have more muted, diffuse rosetting, and no manes on the males (although of course, some male lions are maneless).

   I’ve seen other photos of leopons, including photos of the parents actually in mating posture. The female lion & male leopard were raised together in that instance, to reduce the possibility that one would kill the other during mating. But in the photos that I saw of the mating, it sure looked like that lioness was sedated . The zoo was in Japan & I think it was sometime during the 1960s that the hybrid matings were done. If I recall correctly it was done ostensibly as research to try to determine the degree of relationship between the species. Remember, this was long before the era of DNA testing. I think this may be the same male leopon from that cross.

   
   
   • on January 28, 2014 at 10:13 pm Lisa McDonald

     Because of the vast size difference between a small male leopard and a larger than average lioness, they were not able to mate in the usual posture. So she learned to flop over on her side and in that position he was able to get the job done. The book “Cat Behavior” by Leyhausen documents this. It was interesting to behavioral scientists because it takes a fair amount of thinking ability for an animal to be able to alter its normal breeding behavior and adapt to a different situation.

     
     
4. on March 21, 2012 at 12:51 am kittenz

   Found it.

   From messybeast.com: http://www.messybeast.com/genetics/hyb-leopxlion.htm

   Great info on hybrid felids with many photos and links.

   
   
5. on January 28, 2014 at 10:10 pm Lisa McDonald

   This is Ponko, a leopon born in a zoo in Japan in the 1960s. A small male leopard and a very large lioness were companions of each other and they produced several litters together.

   
   

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