Asian Lioness And Her Cubs Enjoy the London Zoo (PHOTOS)

Abi, a ten-year-old Asian lioness, and her two ten-week-old cubs enjoyed their den at the London Zoo. According to the London Zoo, there are only 300 Asian lions left in the wild, which are categorized as critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. Vote for your favorite photo of Abi and her family!

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Vote and Share Choose Your Top 5 pretty cute. my favorite! Now Make Your Own Top 5 And Share with Your Friends RANK: AVERAGE:  OUT OF 10 Mother Asian lioness, Abi, cuddles with her two ten-week-old cubs at the London Zoo.

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[Mondayboy]

I am sure they are enjoying all that london broil. I also bet they were a bit sick of all the chinese food, dim sun and sushi. they were craving some real meat!!

[rishi851]

You know sometimes I don't understand you folks at all.
We hate on the basis of skin color,race­,nationali­ty and religion and now what is this?
Lets hate our species as a whole?
Humans are just like other animals...­.We adapt and it so happens that we are created to be the best of the best...Isn­'t that the law of the wild?
Lions,Wolfs,Bears ad Sharks are nice but don't ever try to go near them unarmed you know because unlike us they are uncouth and have no emotions to ponder about.
We protect these animals from stuff like Global warming and Bush fires.....­Dont be so hard on us
Our species is here on this planet for a reason and these animals are our entertainment

[AnnArky]

No, I think you're our entertainment.

[TigersEye]

Gandhi said, "“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated”.

I believe that. How we treat each other, and the animals we share this planet with, is a true measure of our conscience. We need to learn about animals, and appreciate them, so they'll be here for generations to come.

[Gladys1963]

We're not the best of the best. We're the only animal species that can reason and think and we tend to do neither when it comes to other species. I agree that other animals are here for a reason and have as much right to be here as we do.

We're not the best when it comes to adaptations. We are able to manipulate our environment to suit our needs, but many species have amazing adaptations that make us seem primitive.

We are accelerating rates of extinction at an unnatural rate. Extinction occurs naturally over thousands of years. We're making it happen in a matter of decades. We lose some plant and animal species before they are even named.

Animals other than humans are not "uncouth"--that would be an anthropomorphism.

And we're not doing nearly enough to protect them.

[peacekitten]

for such magnificent creatures as these lions, all of you who are moaning about their caged existence and how miserable they must be should remember that if they were THAT miserable, they wouldn't be reproducing.

that having been said, you ought to also remember that the REASON the only hope of such magnificent animals continuing to survive is ENTIRELY the fault of mankind.

so don't complain to the zookeepers who have made them happy and secure enough to have cubs. protest the governments of the countries who turn their backs on poachers, and the greed and avarice of your fellow "human beings."

personally, i would rather they survived in well cared for zoos than not exist at all. because if they go extinct, there's NO hope they can ever be reintroduced into the wild. kudos to this zoo for providing them an environment appropriate and safe enough that this mother felt she could have cubs in safety.

[lm945]

The reason so many species are facing extinction is ENTIRELY THE FAULT OF MANKIND.

[DainBramaged]

OOOOOOOO! Pretty Kittehz! Petpetpet.

[anastomosis]

OWWWWW! Munchmunchmunch.

[ziploked]

Another absurd HP Headline.

[lm945]

I'd hardly call living in a cage "enjoying.­"

It's been my experience (and yes, I do have "experience" on the subject), animals would much prefer to live in the wild than in a cage.

I'm not suggesting all the animals in zoos and circuses be taken out of their cages and released. That would be nothing short of murder. A lifetime in captivity leaves them completely unequipped to live in the wild, and easy prey to other animals.

But if they're taught to live in the wild -- as the late George Adamson did, and his protege Tony Fitzjohn does -- they could live their lives as nature intended. Free.

[wolfsvssarah]

I agree, they are such beautiful creatures, but being kept in cages, yuck. They need to be allowed to live naturally in Prides like all Lions do. They are not pets.

[peacekitten]

so what do you suggest be done to make sure they stay alive in the wild?

their biggest enemy is man.

do you think they would be happier extinct?

[lm945]

Man is responsible for the decimation of animal species'.

It is also through the efforts of Man that some of the species are pulling away from the brink of extinction.

By the way, would you prefer to live your entire life in a cage? Especially knowing the only reason for keeping you there was to keep you "safe"?

[evekendall]

Gorgeous, gorgeous animals!

[GeorgieE]

Wait till you see me at the link below.

http://www.cutestdogcompetition.com/vote.cfm?h=64433CFDBB14C52835E465FE29F2FF0F

[CorkiDeCat]

Enjoy?

[crayola 08b]

Hmmmm, she doesn't look that Asian. Maybe she's mixed.

[zort]

I can assure you that she "enjoys" the zoo as you would enjoy years spent in a gulag.

[sushai]

Zoos love breeding their animals because the cute "baby animals" bring in the visitors. What they don't tell you is how they get rid of the older animals to make room for the new ones. Not pretty.

[coracii]

Your last sentence is a complete fabrication, a figment of an overactive imagination when it comes to real accredited zoos. Yes, roadside and third world zoos are a problem that needs to be dealt with, but the hundreds of real zoos in the world don't do anything "not pretty" as you claim to older animals. They're managed for the diseases and pain when necessary and humanely euthanized when treatment is no longer effective. If only we could treat humans with the same compassion through medicine that most zoo animals get it would be a better country.

[squander123]

Absolute nonsense. Who knows what some unaccredited private 'zoos' do, but the proper zoos in western countries don't do anything of the sort. My local zoo recently lost its senior lion, who was in his late 20s, a prodigious age for a lion. The zoo had suspended its breeding programme and any introductions of younger lions for several years in order to let him live out his old age in peace and quiet. He had a really lovely, big and well-designed enclosure,and right up to the end he loved to sit on his hillock in the middle of it and have a good shout a couple of times a day. He'd been there longer than most of the zoo workers, and when he died they genuinely mourned him.

[Sherrie714]

She's absolutely BEAUTIFUL!!

[naschkatze]

Lovely. That has lowered my bp after posting on the health care thread.

[pangurban]

"enjoy" seems absurdly inappropriate

[BunnyFooFoo]

I agree.

[GoodRead]

Of course the Asian lioness and her cubs "enjoy" the London Zoo. What majestic, wild animal would rather live free than to spend its entire life in a pen, a tiny fraction of its natural environment, for the pure and perverse entertainment pleasure of humans.

[Gladys1963]

To GoodRead and Blue Kansas:

Maybe if humans hadn't ruined any chance of the lioness and her cubs being in her natural habitat, that's what she could be doing.

Maybe zoos are the only hope that some species have of surviving on this planet, thereby earning our respect rather than our censure.

Maybe zoos now focus on conservation and education rather than human entertainment.

Maybe the human animal has accelerated the rate of extinction to unnatural levels.

[TigersEye]

I agree and I wish it weren't this way. Humans have desecrated this planet like no other species. We alone are responsible for the state the world is in. Yet we never learn, and the cycle continues.

[grandma58]

Well said and I love the pictures.

[beautyontheinside]

Well said Gladys.
I see these beautiful animals and have tears in my eyes....th­ey are breathtaking.
I have hope for them....th­at as you say, zoos will be more focused on conservation and education.

[coracii]

Of course she'd rather live free, right up until she starved to death because people have killed all the prey species or decimated the habitat that Asian lions used to roam. Either that or she'd be killed for fear that she may take a goat from a herd since it looks like it should be food. The billions of people on the planet continue to ruin this world for all the remaining species.