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Lions in Central and East Africa
Lions in Central and East Africa
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Lions in Central and East Africa
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@sanjay I agree, they look very different from Asiatic lions, but all lion sub-species are very closely related genetic wise, but when it comes to same sub spicies as Barbary and asiatic lions are there is also sub populations like lions from Masai Mara and lions from tsavo are the same sub species, but different sub populations and they looks totally different.
Barbary lions lived in kinda rocky landscape, a weird place for lions to live. And asiatic lions live in dense Forrest's with less density of prey. So it's probably two different appearing sub populations 
@sanjay
the real question is this, are they pure bred "barbary lions" ? To my knowledge, there is no Barbary lion in existance Take a look at inbred Everland Lions, they have a very similar face to these. "Several reviews have considered the history of sightings [7], [19], [20], [26], [27] and the IUCN recognizes that lions persisted in Morocco into the 1940s [17]. Nevertheless these reviews have inadvertently missed, ignored or have lacked access to many local sources and literature accounts. A systematic evaluation of the last sightings in the Maghreb will provide more complete insights into persistence of remnant lion populations and the resilience of large mammalian carnivores to human pressure.Several menageries in Europe held Barbary lions in medieval times [9] and they were popular exhibits in public zoological gardens in the 1800s [7], [20]. By the early 1900s zoos and circuses in Europe and North America often promoted their lions as “Barbary” [13], although true representatives were said to be only found in the collection of the Sultan of Morocco, derived from animals caught by local tribes [20]. The significance of this collection was not recognized until the 1970s after the lions were moved from the Royal Palace, Rabat, to a new zoo at Temara when a study identified animals with physical characteristics of the Barbary lion [20]. Despite several attempts, a formal scientific breeding program is yet to be established (Frey pers. comm.). Nevertheless, captive breeding has experienced a recent renaissance [28], [29] and a studbook for these animals (hereafter ‘Moroccan Royal lions’) has been developed [13]." "Debate surrounds the authenticity of Moroccan Royal lions as descendants of wild Barbary lions [13]. One concern is that Moroccan Royal lions hybridized with sub-Saharan African lions potentially introduced to the collection before the 1970s [20]. Definitive genetic matches have not yet been established between Moroccan Royal lions and wild Barbary lions [13]. The few studies of Barbary lions that utilize museum samples [14] are limited by the scarcity of wild-origin reference specimens. Most recent genetic studies [30], [31], [32] rely on Royal lion samples from two zoos, covering at most 4 (possibly only 2) of the 12 maternal bloodlines [13]. In the absence of genetic data, owing to the lack of verified wild specimens, and working on the precautionary presumption that Barbary lions are taxonomically distinct from other lions, assessment of purity relies on ‘pedigree information’ which at best can be taken from the recently established studbook of lions of known ancestry arising from the Moroccan Royal Collection [13].The North African-Asian population of lions [14] is only represented by today’s Asiatic lion (c.350 wild individuals and c.100 zoo captives), so the potential significance of captive Moroccan Royal lions (c.90 individuals) is not trivial [13]. In the absence of definitive genetic comparisons we examine the generational separation between lions surveyed in Temara Zoo in 1974 and wild-caught Barbary ancestors. This infers the degree of opportunity for hybridization had non-Barbary individuals bred within the Royal collection, and the potential purity and relevance of the extant captive population."http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0060174 Very interesting read when you get a chance ^^
Everland Lion
 *This image is copyright of its original author One of the images posted  *This image is copyright of its original author  (06-10-2015, 03:34 PM)'sanjay' Wrote: Question to Guate, Peter and other lion expertsLike Pckts said, the problem here is how "pure" are those lions? The answer is "zero". Yes, the last genetic test on the lions in the Rabat Zoo (considered the most pure in existence) showed that they are Central African lions from maternal origin and just Barbary from paternal side. That is why Dr Yamaguchi desisted of his project of reintroduction. In fact, the last study of Dr Barnett and Yamaguchi (2015, I think) showed that the Indian lions are more "Barbary" than those of the Rabat zoo, and that they are the most plausible for a reintroduction. What you are seeing here is not the "barbary" face, but just 3 lions with wide faces, even the fourth and last lion is no different than some of the huge Crater lions from East Africa. It is possible that males from the north of Africa do had large heads, Yamaguchi quoted a maximum of c.360 mm but J. H. Mazák probably measured one of c.410-420 mm, a real giant but still no significantly larger than the largest from East Africa (c.406 cm) and of the same size than the largest of Southern Africa (419 mm according with Dr Hemmer), without mentioning the giant skull of c.430 cm (which came from Rowland Ward Records of Big Game). Old zoologist used the same method that you used here, they classified they lion "subspecies" based in external characteristics, but only used one or two lions for that, and most of the time, captive specimens. That is why there are so many lion "subspecies" in literature, but at the end, that is not the case. Genetic studies showed that there are only 2 subspecies with they own clades, and in this form, west and north African lions belongs to the same group that Indian ones. If you see a picture of lions in west Africa, they are like a copy-past of Indian lions. The Barbary ones lived in a different habitat, with a larger mane and probably other adaptations (larger mouths and noises?), but those are just clinal differences, like Dr Kitchener showed in tigers. Morphological differences are not enough to erect a "subspecies", there most be a deeper analysis and supported by the use of DNA and a large sample of specimens. In this case, evidence suggest that Barbary lions are of the same "Asian" group, which invaded Africa from Persia, after the return of the desertic areas to the center of the African continent. By the way, check these Asiatic lions:  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author They also have huge faces, don't you think? And remember that these are wild males, not captive specimens like those "Barbary" ones. [img]images/smilies/wink.gif[/img] 
This is an article I stumble upon. Not sure about the inbreeding part but it's pretty unusual.
https://www.thedodo.com/lion-brothers-father-pride-1207737122.html   (06-10-2015, 03:34 PM)sanjay Wrote: Question to Guate, Peter and other lion experts Sanjay I was fortunate to see some of the Barbary lions in Temara zoo in Morocco in the 1970's and early 1980's..the closest picture to them is the bottom one, they were massive lions with pale clear iris, short thick legs, and luxurious manes. They look different to Asiatic lions a d I believe they should be classified separately but the way we classify animals is through the proximity of their mitochondrial DNA and not morphology...so yes Barbary and Asiatic lions are considered the same species with some authorities or two closely related subspecies by others. The subspecies question is one of conservation more than biology when it comes to lions...the differences between different lions are smaller than the differences between human racial group so there should be really one species of lions, jaguars, snow leopards, and cheetahs with no subspecies....two subspecies of tigers (mainland and sunda) and three of leopards ( African, West Asian, and Asian). The problem is you will get less attention trying to conserve Amur tigers if you say there are 100,000 leopards in the world...now if you say there are less than 50 Amur leopards the situation becomes far more urgent.
an other unwarranted death of a symbolic lion.
http://africageographic.com/blog/graphic...-the-lion/  (03-31-2016, 04:13 PM)LionKiss Wrote: an other unwarranted death of a symbolic lion. Sad story already mentioned in the "Big cats news" topic. (03-24-2016, 09:08 PM)Pckts Wrote: @Dr. Panthera The royal collection of King Mohammad V was made up of wild caught Atlas ( Barbary lion cubs in the 1940's) this "gift" to the king had more male cubs than females and lived at the royal court, the king's son and successor Hassan II moved the lions to Temara zoo outside his capital city Rabat, the biologists of the zoo decided to "correct" the male numerical abundance by mating some of the lions with captive lionesses from West African origin, this was in the 1970's....further breeding was as far as I know from the same group of lions. So the Temara lions are the closest thing to a Barbary lion as they are Barbary X West African hybrids with more than 50% of original Barbary genes, the claimed Barbary lions in several European zoos and facilities are lions of even more complex mixed genetic origin and can not be compared to the Temara lions. The difficulty in breeding back 100% Barbary lions have made the Moroccan government abandon plans of reintroducing the lions to the Atlas but I believe with more determination and international assistance and expertise this can materialize. |
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