Liger...Liger Burning Bright!!!

AMAZING ANIMAL....!! The 10ft Liger who's still growing... Liger------ He looks like something from a prehistoric age or a fantastic creationfrom Hollywood.But Hercules is very much living flesh and blood - as he proves everytime he opens his gigantic mouth to roar. Part lion, part tiger, he is not just a big cat but a huge one,standing 10ft tall on his back legs. Called a liger, in reference to his crossbreed parentage, he is thelargest of all the cat species.On a typical day he will devour 20lb of meat, usually beef or chicken,and is capable of eating 100lb at a single setting. At just three years old, Hercules already weighs half a ton. When he is fully grown he is expected to reach 12ft( from tip of his nose to the tip of his tail!!!), and almost 900 pounds!!!. He is the accidental result of two enormous big cats living closetogether at the Institute of Greatly Endangered and Rare Species, in Miami,Florida, and already dwarfs both his parents. "Ligers are not something we planned on having," said institute ownerDr Bhagavan Antle. "We have lions and tigers living together in large enclosures and atfirst we had no idea how well one of the lion boys was getting along with atiger girl, then lo and behold we had a liger." 50mph runner -------------Hercules has the strength of a lion and the speed of a tiger, reaching 50mph.












He will also grow a mane like his father, but just a small one, andsports his mother's tiger stripes on his huge body. And when he opens hisfearsome mouth he can both roar like a lion and give a purr-like snort like his mother. Not only that, but he likes to swim, a feat unheard of amongwater-fearing lions. In the wild it is virtually impossible for lions and tigers to mate.Not only are they enemies likely to kill one another, but most lions arein Africa and most tigers in Asia. But incredible though he is, Hercules is not unique. Ligers have been bred in captivity, deliberately and accidentally, since shortly beforeWorldWar II. Today there are believed to be a handful of ligers around the worldand a similar number of tigons, the product of a tiger father and lionmother. Tigons are smaller than ligers and take on more physicalcharacteristicsof the tiger.Famous cross-breeds --------------------- There are hundreds of hybrids in the animal world, some common such asthe> mule - a cross between a female horse and a male donkey - and somemore unusual, such as the labradoodle, a mix of labrador and poodle. Other exotic hybrids include the zeedonk, a cross between a zebra anda donkey; the zorse or zebroid, a zebra/horse cross; and the beefalo, an American bison/ domestic cow cross. Another rare creature is the wolphin, the offspring of a whale and a> dolphin. Back in the big cat world zoos in Japan, Germany and Italy have bred leopons, a male leopard/lioness cross, while Salzburg Zoo in Austriahas bred jaguar/leopard hybrids known as lepjags