So, I was sent these pictures with the following text:
In a zoo in California , a mother tiger gave birth to a rare set of triplet tiger cubs. Unfortunately, due to complications in the pregnancy, the cubs were born prematurely and due to their tiny size, they died shortly after birth.
The mother tiger after recovering from the delivery, suddenly started to decline in health,
although physically she was fine. The veterinarians felt that the loss of her litter had caused
the tigress to fall into a depression. The doctors decided that if the tigress could surrogate
another mother's cubs, perhaps she would improve.
After checking with many other zoos across the country, the depressing news was that there
were no tiger cubs of the right age to introduce to the mourning mother. The veterinarians
decided to try something that had never been tried in a zoo environment. Sometimes a mother
of one species will take on the care of a different species. The only orphans" that could be
found quickly, were a litter of weanling pigs. The zoo keepers and vets wrapped the piglets in
tiger skin and placed the babies around the mother tiger. Would they become cubs or pork chops?
Take a look...you won't believe your eyes!!
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to get a larger picture) |
Seems great at face value doesn't it. Well, would you really say "a zoo in California" without being specific? Probably not. Also, as I live in California, this would be all over the local news if it were true.
That said, if you are happy with the story above and want to live in happy land, then read no further.
A little research shows that this is not even in the US and looks to be from somewhere in Asia. Potentially tied to "Tiger baiting" where tigers are starved and then introduced to various animals for the sake of gambling. Participants have the ability to bet on which animal they think is going to last the longest before they are devoured by the tiger. The photos taken above are apparently legitimate and were a test to see if they could confuse the tiger into leaving the piglets alone for a longer period by wrapping them in the skins of dead tiger cubs. (The tiger cubs having been killed earlier by being introduced to a different tiger family). The purpose of which is to simply extend the amount of betting that can take place.
The email story above the pictures was made up as a joke to see if people would look at sick photos and think they are cute.
Actually, I just made all that up (the bit about the tiger baiting), but you were falling for it weren't you - see you can be manipulated into thinking anything. (Hog - there is no water powered car!) Best we can tell is that these photos were from Sriracha Tiger Zoo just outside of Bangkok in Thailand. The zoo has some kind of circus/carnival thing and these photos were taken at that. They were picked up by someone who decided to make up the story about the zoo in California to see how much spam they could create on the basis that the pictures were cute.
