Comparing Cats: A Discussion of Similarities & Differences

[BorneanTiger]

@Hello Panthera leo leo would refer to the Maghrebi (Northwest African) Barbary lion (or nowadays, the "Northern lion subspecies" that is considered to include the Barbary and Asiatic lions, as well as extant lions from northern parts of Africa, including West Africa), with Panthera leo melanochaita referring to the Cape lion of South Africa (or nowadays, the "Southern lion subspecies" that is considered to include the Cape lion, extant South African lions, and others lions in Southern and Southeastern Africa): https://repository.si.edu/bitstream/hand...=y#page=71

@parduscat For Northern lions (Panthera leo leo, including the West African and Asiatic lions) yes, but if you're talking about Southern lions (Panthera leo melanochaita, including lions in South Africa, Namibia, and Tanzania), which are bigger than the former, it's more complicated:

Northern lion at Pendjari National Park, Benin, West Africa, by Jonas van der Voorde (1st of April, 2013):
   

Southern lion at Etosha National Park (northern Namibia) and a Bengal tiger at Kaziranga National Park (northeast India), credits: Africa Photography and Kanwar Juneja (India Nature Watch)
   

Apart from that, here is a picture of a ligress (Panthera leo × Panthera tigris) between its parent species in 1904, by the Indie Journal:
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