A Lion that Barks?
Here's a really funny story for you all the way from China! A Chinese zoo's "African lion" was exposed as a trickster when it started barking!BEIJING, August 2013 (AFP/The Whiz Times).
What happened was this. A customer wanted to show her son the different sounds animals made. But the little boy pointed out that the animal in the cage labelled "African lion" was barking, and not growling or roaring!
The animal was actually a Tibetan mastiff -- a large and long-haired breed of dog.
A Tibetan mastiff dogImage by AFP PHOTO / Ed Jones
But it wasn't just the hairy dog lion imposter who was caught out. The zoo in the People's Park of Luohe, in the central province of Henan, had replaced other exotic exhibits with common species.
There were also two coypu rodents (a kind of big mouse) in a snake's cage, a white fox in a leopard's den, and another dog in a wolf pen.
The chief of the park's animal department had an explanation though. He said that while the zoo does have a lion, it had been taken to a breeding centre and the dog -- which belonged to an employee -- was only temporarily put in the lion's cage.
Featured image by Eric Kilby/Flickr/Creative Commons.
