The African lion is nothing if not a magnificent beast; in fact, it is because of this that it has been bestowed the title “King of Beasts” by multiple civilizations throughout the millennia. We will try to do the lion Justice in this short article, by appraising you of facts about the lion that you may find to be of interest. Some of these facts will cover what lions eat, at what point in their lives they begin to roar that thunderous roar well-known throughout the animal kingdom, as well as how much protein they get in their diets.
Name of the lion is Panthera Leo, and it is a mammalian carnivore from the phylum Chordata. In the following size range we will try to cover the stats on both the lioness (which is a female lion) and the male lion: the head and body together spans from about 4 1/2 feet to 6 1/2 feet. When you include the tail the size range covers a further 26 inches to almost 40 inches. The average female lions tend to be around 265 very powerful pounds; whereas the average male is a much larger 425 pounds of pure muscle – and he doesn’t lose any speed despite the increase. In fact, the male African lion actually has a greater acceleration ability than the female lion; the lioness can reach the same velocity, however.
Size of the Male African Lion
When you consider that the male lion can be up to 10 feet long – with the tail included – and a stunning 500 pounds of absolute muscle, there’s no wonder that it is both an apex predator and a Keystone predator on whatever lands it inhabits – whether it’s the Serengeti, Kruger National Park, the Masai Mara, the Okavango crater and the Giants of Botswana. As big as the male lion is, it is considerably smaller than the largest member of the cat family in the Tiger. Panthera Tigris can be up to 13 feet long and weigh a formidable 660 pounds.
More Facts About the Lion
Out of all of the impressive things about the line, the sheer force of its roar may take the top prize – but that obviously depends on who you ask. It is a truly mighty yell, in that it can be heard in excess of 8 km (that would be 5 miles for American educated people). People who have visited liens on African safari and hurt his roar has stated that it can give you a headache from 10 m away. This trumpeting sound starts to truly manifest itself when the lion turns about one year old, and is a crucial vocalization method for the only social Big Cat.
Lines live in groups called prides, which can be as large as a unit of three – which usually involves a single male and two female cats – or as large as 40. As you can well imagine, it takes quite a lot of water Buffalo and other pray to feed a family of 40; which is why such groups almost always have more than a single lion – although only one of them is king. His brother lions act almost exclusively as support in guarding the kingdom. They may not have much access to the lionesses, but they definitely get first dibs when it comes to eating freshly killed prey.
Lastly for facts about the lion, the mane of the male lion signals fitness and is thus attractive to lionesses. Lines that have dark, full manes tend to win battles with reckless abandon throughout their robust youth and middle-age. Once he conquers the former king to usurp his pride, he makes it a point to kill all the cubs in order for the lionesses to come back into estrus and be accepting of his own seed.
