WildFact
Avoca Male Lions and Their Male Lineage - Printable Version

+- WildFact (https://wildfact.com/forum)
+-- Forum: Information Section (https://wildfact.com/forum/forum-information-section)
+--- Forum: Terrestrial Wild Animals (https://wildfact.com/forum/forum-terrestrial-wild-animals)
+---- Forum: Wild Cats (https://wildfact.com/forum/forum-wild-cats)
+----- Forum: Lion (https://wildfact.com/forum/forum-lion)
+----- Thread: Avoca Male Lions and Their Male Lineage (/topic-avoca-male-lions-and-their-male-lineage)



RE: Avoca male lions - afortich - 08-24-2023

(08-24-2023, 05:11 AM)WildLeonis Wrote:
(08-24-2023, 04:38 AM)afortich Wrote: Attacking and killing their parents/relatives do not prove that they have no memory or remember them.
One thing is the memory or capability of remembering, and another thing is competition and the savage nature of the lions. It is like saying that the person who killed any or all of his/her parent has no memory or don't remember after not seen them in 20 years.

We cannot measure their capability of recognizing/remembering/memory. How would you know if the lion that killed his father didn't remember him??

Good point. I think some may be viewing memory through the lens of humans. Though you just made a comparison to humans yourself. :) But I digress. My point just because a lion may remember a littermate ie a sister or brother (or parent) that doesn’t mean they will give that “family” member a pass because they are family. Depending on the situation they could respond as strongly as attacking and killing the former family member or they could give a warning but not initiate a full on attack. 

There is footage of lions recognizing their human companions after years of separation. So I think it’s very possible that the S.Avocas and Mohawk would recognize each other after years of no contact. However, that doesn’t mean a meeting would be drama free or be disastrous. Again, I think it would depend on the circumstances.

Exactly, as you said above "it would depend on the circumstances". Therefore, whether the reunion was amicably or disastrous would depend on how strong/weak the relationship/bond between those lions were, the individual nature of each lion/lioness, and if any of them is territorial, nomads, food, etc.


RE: Avoca male lions - BA0701 - 08-24-2023

(08-24-2023, 04:12 AM)Ngonya Wrote:
(08-24-2023, 03:57 AM)Tr1x24 Wrote: @Tylermartin! There is no way Mohawk and S.Avocas would recognize each other, last time they saw each other was 2016 (6 yrs ago) and they where only subs.

They are nothing but rivals at this point, and if they somehow link as nomads, it would be purely based of a "chance" as any other unrelated males.

We love those "bloodline" ,"long lost brothers" stories, but that doesnt work like that in reality.

With lions, if you are not part of the same group, you are rivals, regardless of you connection in the past and blood, especially as time passes.

Mhangenis kiled her own aunt, who raised them, only 1,2 years after their link broked, Kambulas almost killed their Mhangeni mother in similar fashion and theres many more examples.

Let alone lions who didnt interact for 5+ yrs.
we can't forget previous stories...
There are possibilities that the Rollercoaster males could have fought or even killed one of their fathers (wsm). 

Also: Monwana males probably finished their father, BDM, after he was injuried by buffalo
ofc those arent "brotherhood" situations, yet the males still spent about the same amount of time (or less) separated from their fathers as S. avoca have been separated from N. avoca

It is funny (odd), that you bring up the WSM/Rollercoaster males. I was just reading a couple of days ago, that WSM were the likely fathers of the Rollercoasters, but also that there is a possibility that the Rollercoasters fathered the two youngest Mapogos (apparently seen mating with Sparta lionesses around the time of conception). A conversation for another thread, but I found it funny that you mentioned them when I was just reading about this.


RE: Avoca male lions - BigLion39 - 08-26-2023

Lions don't really recognize each other by sight too much, especially since lions are extremely similar looking. They more resort to scent. So, if for example, Southern Avoca brother doesn't recognize his long lost N. Avoca brothers scent then he will not remember him. The recognition process starts welllll before the lions are remotely close enough to see each other. So if its been years without smelling them they aren't going to remember them by seeing them. Lions seeing trainers they didn't see for months I think is different because human scent is so different than lions scent and we look so different. It might be why they will recognize a long lost trainer??? Who knows??? But we can see sometimes when a male is with another pride he controls for a time, comes back to his main pride he controls, the females don't recognize the other prides scent and the lionesses attack the male.  We see this all the time. So scent is the major factor in recognizing each other.


RE: Avoca male lions - Duco Ndona - 08-26-2023

Lions resort to all their available senses to recognize eachother. Scent is an important one, but they also know who is who by voice, vision and such. Afteral they also recognize contact calls, or each other during a rainstorm. So if a meeting comes to a point where a decision has to be made of fight, flight or friend. They are close enough to have access to plenty of information to recognize eachother.

It makes more sense for a lion to be better at recognizing and remembering individual lions over individual humans. So that they are recognizing caretakers from that long back is a good reason to believe that they can recognize lions from even longer back.

I think the role scent plays is that all the rubbing and bonding forms a group scent that overlays the personal scent of a lion. This scent functions as a bit of a passport that can linger for a long time, and does erode over time. But its not a sacret golden rule or anything. If a lion loses it and the rest has no reason to believe the lion is out of the group, they happily reapply it. And if they kick a member out, the lingering scent isnt going to fool them to let him or her back in again.

In the avocas case, the suriving Avoca would have zero traces of his old scent passport and left over traces of its passport of his current coalition. While there is no good reason for Mohawk to believe for his long lost brother to come back to him after all those years. For all he knows they might be there to drive him out.


RE: Avoca male lions - Horizon - 08-26-2023

" target="_blank" class="post_link">



RE: Avoca male lions - afortich - 08-26-2023

(08-26-2023, 11:39 AM)BigLion39 Wrote: Lions don't really recognize each other by sight too much, especially since lions are extremely similar looking. They more resort to scent. So, if for example, Southern Avoca brother doesn't recognize his long lost N. Avoca brothers scent then he will not remember him. The recognition process starts welllll before the lions are remotely close enough to see each other. So if its been years without smelling them they aren't going to remember them by seeing them. Lions seeing trainers they didn't see for months I think is different because human scent is so different than lions scent and we look so different. It might be why they will recognize a long lost trainer??? Who knows??? But we can see sometimes when a male is with another pride he controls for a time, comes back to his main pride he controls, the females don't recognize the other prides scent and the lionesses attack the male.  We see this all the time. So scent is the major factor in recognizing each other.

I believe that we human think we know so much about whether animals (lions) remember/recognize but we don't really know much. 
There is a story of Christian the lion that was adopted by people, which has to be released in wild at the age of about 1 year old, and after they came back to see him after 1 year and were told the Christian will not recognize them but guess what, Christian the lion did.





Then, if not mistaken they came back after another year later (already 2) and Christian the lion recognized them.





If we human, instead of making assumptions based on a few studied facts, perform a complete study on animals (lions), it wouldn't be surprising to find out how little we know about animals (lions) capability to recognize and their behavior.
The fact that they attack or not another animal/person they knew, it is not a memory indicator.


RE: Avoca male lions - Mapokser - 08-26-2023

@BA0701 Mr.T and KT split in mid 2008 and KT died in mid 2010. So it's around 2 years, but it wasn't 2 years since they have seen each other for the last time.

While Mapogos were operating as 2 different coalitions, they weren't completely split and still controlled the Tsalala pride together. They were neighbors so they were always hearing each other's roars and they would meet up sometimes.

There are some photos and videos from them meeting up in early 2009, as well as 3 Western Mapogos deep in the northern part of Mlowathi territory.

A few days before KT was killed, in May 2010, Leopard Hills reports 5 Mapogos together deep in the West, meaning either Mr.T or KT was visiting their brothers' core territory.

So rather than being accepted back after a long time, it was more that the other Mapogos just had to got used to Mr.T being around all the time instead of just hearing him roaring to the east and meeting up from time to time.

Even DM Avoca under similar circumstances couldn't manage to rejoin his coalition and was forced to go nomadic after being ousted. Mr.T was lucky to have kept proper contact and the fact they were still sharing a pride together.

With Mohawk and the S.Avocas, it's more than 5 years without any contact at all, not even hearing each other in the distance.


RE: Avoca male lions - Tylermartin! - 08-27-2023

So I was told the southern avoca male did chase the kambula females off of a kill that day he arrived


RE: Avoca male lions - KM600 - 08-27-2023

(08-27-2023, 10:05 AM)Tylermartin! Wrote: So I was told the southern avoca male did chase the kambula females off of a kill that day he arrived

There’s an abundance of cubs in the Kambula pride, hoping the females were able to steer the Southern Avoca male away before it was too late.


RE: Avoca male lions - BigLion39 - 08-27-2023

(08-26-2023, 10:24 PM)afortich Wrote: believe that we human think we know so much about whether animals (lions) remember/recognize but we don't really know much.
Dude, yes, 10000%!!! I agree so much here! I read so many things, studies and I start to think we have no idea really! For example the male lion mane question about color, size, etc.... I believe we have absolutely no idea about a lot of these things.


RE: Avoca male lions - afortich - 08-27-2023

(08-27-2023, 12:27 PM)BigLion39 Wrote:
(08-26-2023, 10:24 PM)afortich Wrote: believe that we human think we know so much about whether animals (lions) remember/recognize but we don't really know much.
Dude, yes, 10000%!!! I agree so much here! I read so many things, studies and I start to think we have no idea really! For example the male lion mane question about color, size, etc.... I believe we have absolutely no idea about a lot of these things.

Buddy, I know you are very knowledgeable about lions, and I respect that a lot, and believe everything you said above. 
I apologize because after reading my own message, it could be understood in a negative way but was not my intention. 
However, in my humble opinion, all I wanted to say is that besides all you said that I believe to be true, we still do not have enough information yet about the memory of animals.


RE: Avoca male lions - Tylermartin! - 08-27-2023

(08-27-2023, 01:33 PM)afortich Wrote:
(08-27-2023, 12:27 PM)BigLion39 Wrote:
(08-26-2023, 10:24 PM)afortich Wrote: believe that we human think we know so much about whether animals (lions) remember/recognize but we don't really know much.
Dude, yes, 10000%!!! I agree so much here! I read so many things, studies and I start to think we have no idea really! For example the male lion mane question about color, size, etc.... I believe we have absolutely no idea about a lot of these things.

Buddy, I know you are very knowledgeable about lions, and I respect that a lot, and believe everything you said above. 
I apologize because after reading my own message, it could be understood in a negative way but was not my intention. 
However, in my humble opinion, all I wanted to say is that besides all you said that I believe to be true, we still do not have enough information yet about the memory of animals.
Honestly anything can happen as of right now


RE: Avoca male lions - afortich - 08-27-2023

(08-24-2023, 05:17 AM)Tylermartin! Wrote:
(08-24-2023, 05:11 AM)WildLeonis Wrote:
(08-24-2023, 04:38 AM)afortich Wrote: Attacking and killing their parents/relatives do not prove that they have no memory or remember them.
One thing is the memory or capability of remembering, and another thing is competition and the savage nature of the lions. It is like saying that the person who killed any or all of his/her parent has no memory or don't remember after not seen them in 20 years.

We cannot measure their capability of recognizing/remembering/memory. How would you know if the lion that killed his father didn't remember him??

Good point. I think some may be viewing memory through the lens of humans. Though you just made a comparison to humans yourself. :) But I digress. My point just because a lion may remember a littermate ie a sister or brother (or parent) that doesn’t mean they will give that “family” member a pass because they are family. Depending on the situation they could respond as strongly as attacking and killing the former family member or they could give a warning but not initiate a full on attack. 

There is footage of lions recognizing their human companions after years of separation. So I think it’s very possible that the S.Avocas and Mohawk would recognize each other after years of no contact. However, that doesn’t mean a meeting would be drama free or be disastrous. Again, I think it would depend on the circumstances.

What will Mohawk do tho he’s ran from every lion he’s seen since blondie died so him being aggressive to his older brother might be out of the question right? Didn’t he run from S8 and he hasn’t roared in how long?

@Tylermartin!, based on Mohawk's recent behavior, I would speculate/predict that he won't be aggressive towards his older brothers. 
However, I do not dare to speculate the same about the Southern Avocas, I would need more information for a better prediction.


RE: Avoca male lions - Duco Ndona - 08-27-2023

It kinda depends on how much he sees his current group as a coalition and the circumstances of their meeting. 

If Mohawk sees his current pose as his new coalition and meets his brother while he is with his group. 
He will be reluctant on meeting or joining him and largely follow the reaction his sons will have. 

If he sees his sons as just the remnant of the pride he was with. He may see the meeting as a opportunity to form a new coalition and ditch his sons.


RE: Avoca male lions - afortich - 08-27-2023

(08-27-2023, 11:29 PM)Duco Ndona Wrote: It kinda depends on how much he sees his current group as a coalition and the circumstances of their meeting. 

If Mohawk sees his current pose as his new coalition and meets his brother while he is with his group. 
He will be reluctant on meeting or joining him and largely follow the reaction his sons will have. 

If he sees his sons as just the remnant of the pride he was with. He may see the meeting as a opportunity to form a new coalition and ditch his sons.

I totally agree with u my friend.