October 6
Let me start by apologizing for how long it has been since my last entry. We have been busy here at Great Cats, let me tell you! As you may know, our bats are here in the Bat Cave at Lion/Tiger Hill, and we have been catching them up so that we can do some much needed work on their home. We also separated the boys from the girls because they were breeding just a little too successfully. The final count was 794 bats, not counting the pups that are still with their mothers. That's a lot of bats, especially when you are catching them one at a time with a net. So you can see that we have had our hands full here. We have found a good home for the girls at the Akron Zoo, and the boys will stay here with us.
But on to the tiger cubs. The boys are doing great. They go outside by about 7:30 in the morning and stay until at least noon. They use the yard nearest Think Tank now. This way they are using the same yard that their father, Rokan, uses later in the day instead of the yard used by Soyono's mother, Kerinci. Two female tigers would never share territory in the wild, so Soy is much happier with this arrangement. Soyono does not usually go out with them right away, but enjoys a little quiet time by herself for an hour or two. She lets us know when she is ready to go out by bellowing.
In the wild, a tiger's call can be heard for miles, so to hear it indoors in a relatively small space is an attention-getter. Like most cats, she knows how to get what she wants.
The cubs rarely nurse anymore, and are eating three pounds of meat per day each. This increases pretty regularly, and we have just started to feed them in separate enclosures. Besar (he was always the biggest cub) can be a stinker when it comes to food, and we want to make sure that everyone gets plenty to eat. Jalan (the laid back one) is as big as Besar and can hold his own, but Marah (smaller, but feisty) was at a disadvantage. Feeding everyone separately also lets us put Soyono on a diet. She has lost eight pounds so far!
As the boys' interest in meat has increased, the difficulty of getting them inside has decreased. Up until about two weeks ago, the keepers usually had to shut Soy inside when it was time for everyone to come in and then go out in the yard and chase the cubs in. We would put on big gloves and bring a rake with us, partly because they were a little afraid of the rake, and partly for personal protection. You never know when the day will come when a cub stops being afraid and decides to stand his ground. These "tiger rodeos" were becoming kind of popular with the public and people were timing their visits so they could watch. Anyone who saw it, however, got a good demonstration that these cubs are not pets! They did not want us in their yard, and we weren't too crazy about the idea either. Fortunately, the cubs suddenly made the connection between going inside and getting food, and life got easier for everyone.
I promise the next entry will not take so long. Next, getting weighed on the "big boy" scale and the beginning of training!
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