Image used for representational purpose only
TNN | Sep 1, 2018, 08:17 IST
KOLKATA: After two decades, a lion cub was born in the Alipore Zoological Gardens last Sunday. The cub was born to 11-year-old Viswas and 5-yearold Sruti, a pair of Asiatic lion brought from the Hyderabad zoo under an animal exchange programme last October. Alipore zoo director A K Samanta said the last lion cub was born in the zoo in 1998.
A female eastern grey kangaroo gifted by the Yokohama zoo in Japan last year also gave birth to a joey. The new addition takes the kangaroo count in zoo to five — two males, Melonpan and Mint, and two females, Punka and Kinako, were brought from the Japan zoo on October 26 last year.
Samanta said that Punka, aged around two now, gave birth to the joey. “It conceived in February this year. In mid-March, it developed maggots inside its pouch and while treating it, we came to know that it has already given birth. Only three days ago, the joey popped out of its mother’s pouch for the first time. Some visitors also got a glimpse of it that day,” said Samanta.
The young kangaroo or joey is born at a very immature stage when it’s only about 2cm long and weighs less than a gram. Immediately after birth it crawls up the mother’s body and enters the pouch. While red kangaroos leave the pouch at around eight months and continue to suckle for another three to four months, grey kangaroos leave at about 11 months, continuing to suckle until they are as old as 18 months.
The last kangaroo — a red one — was born in the zoo in 2011. It had died in the zoo in November 2015. The joey was born to one of the four red kangaroos brought from the Czech Republic. Three of them died of myopathy that affects their muscles.
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/kolkata/kolkata-alipore-zoo-welcomes-lion-cub-after-two-decades/articleshow/65631146.cms
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