While the Bible may say that the leopard will lie down with the goat, at an animal park in Russia it is a tiger that has adopted a goat as a bunk mate.
Right around the date Americans were sitting down to devour their turkeys, the goat was put into the tiger enclosure to serve as live prey for the tiger to eat. But, the goat apparently stood up for himself, and now he and the tiger are living in a friendly fashion at the Safari Park in Primorsky Krai, Russia.
The two — Timur the goat and Amur the tiger — eat together, wander their enclosure together, lie down together, and at night the goat initially took the tiger’s bed and the tiger climbed to the roof to sleep. After about a week, the animal keepers began putting the two into separate enclosures at night so both had shelter; however, when they are released in the morning the two animals join together.
According to the keepers, the tiger seems calmer than it used to be, and even protective of the goat.
Only time will tell if these two animals maintain their seemingly respectful existence together. In the meantime, Park workers are still feeding live prey to the tiger twice a week; but, now they just send in rabbits.
Safari Park information is on line, in Russian, at www.safaripark25.ru. Photos and video of the goat and tiger together are available.
A December 2, 2015 park video shows the two animals together.
