Yahoo – AFP,
10 Dec 2015
Moscow (AFP) - A goat sent to a Russian safari park as live prey for a Siberian tiger has instead befriended the big cat and the two have become inseparable in a story that has captivated Russia.
Amur the tiger rests close to a goat named Timur in the Primorye Safari Park (AFP Photo/Dmitry Mezentsev) |
Moscow (AFP) - A goat sent to a Russian safari park as live prey for a Siberian tiger has instead befriended the big cat and the two have become inseparable in a story that has captivated Russia.
Amur the
tiger and Timur the goat now sleep in the same enclosure in the Primorsky
safari park outside the Pacific port city of Vladivostok, eating and playing
together in the snow. And this week they even playfully head-butted each other.
The story
of the unusual friendship has touched hearts in Russia, with the safari park
releasing regular updates on the pair and planning to install webcams in their
enclosure.
Staff at
the park say the male tiger, who has been given live animals to hunt and eat
twice a week, did not touch the billy goat when it entered the enclosure last
month because the goat did not show any fear.
"No
one had taught the goat to be afraid of tigers," the park said in a
statement.
Zoo chief
Dmitry Mezentsev, who studies tigers and leopards, described the unlikely
friendship as nothing short of a miracle.
"This
is a sign from above," Mezentsev told AFP on Thursday.
"People,
take a look at yourselves. There are wars everywhere -- Ukraine, Syria. While
such different animals can live together in peace."
Mezentsev
said staff realised the tiger would not eat the goat after the two had spent
three days together.
Timur now
sleeps inside the shelter where Amur previously rested, while the tiger spends
the night on the roof.
A morning
stroll
They meet
up in the morning to walk around the spacious enclosure, with the goat usually
following the tiger. Over the past few days, they have begun playing together
and chasing each other.
On
Wednesday, Timur challenged Amur, poking him with his horns.
"The
tiger accepted the goat's challenge," the safari park said.
"He
pushed his forehead against Timur's horns, the friends butted heads for five
seconds without coming to blows, after which Amur calmly went to bask in the
sun on the hill."
The tiger
has also attempted to teach the goat how to catch prey and has recently taken a
great interest in a block of salt given to Timur.
Amur is now
being fed live rabbits for lunch -- "out of respect for goats," said
Mezentsev.
Many
praised the story as a welcome respite from a stream of doom-and-gloom news in
a sanctions-hit nation that has been accused of fanning an insurgency in eastern
Ukraine and which began a bombing campaign in Syria in September.
Breaking
the gloom
"We
liked the story of the friendship between the tiger and the goat simply because
a normal person cannot always live amid the lies, hatred and humiliation,"
Gazeta.ru online wrote in an op-ed this week.
"One
would like to believe it is possible not to gobble up the weak but be friends
with them."
With the
exchange rate also keeping Russians awake at night, the mass-circulation
Komsomolskaya Pravda on Thursday went as far as to publish a joke about it.
"We
are so tired of this rubbish! Any news on the tiger and the goat instead?"
The story
has sparked calls for a fundraising campaign for the remote zoo, while many are
worried that nature will prevail and Timur will eventually perish.
State news
agency TASS quoted Novosibirsk zoo director Rostislav Shilo as saying the
chance of the tiger eating the goat was 80 to 85 percent.
Mezentsev,
however, begged to disagree.
"Timur
is in no more danger than a human living next to another human."
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