MY NATURAL NEED TO NURTURE OR BEING TRUE TO NATURE

Putting my actions in line with my beliefs?

Taai and Mela look out from atop a boulder at LLA

My heart was torn between the two courses of action. My own lion loves, Taai and Mela could have cubs.

In nature these lions would be free to mate and breed. My mission statement is to give them the most natural living conditions lions can have in captivity. Where do I draw the line, how do I decide who gets to live here, how is it that I get to decide, Playing God? To sterilise or to allow nature to fulfill Mela's need to nurture.

Everyday I walk in the veld under the condemning sun. My legs ache with weakness my chest constricts in breathless quakes. Yet the joy I feel at seeing Natacha rolling and rubbing against Moya, the relief I feel on observing Shannon gazing across the valleys as Reign bounds up to lie on the boulder alongside of him; the deep sigh I emit when Taai and Mela touch foreheads, makes it all worthwhile
 Love fills my unfit soul.

These lions have come from small flat treeless endless rectangular walks.
I am proud of their enclosures but I know that this is wrong. They should not be here. They should not be fenced in even within these superior camps. No more of this. No more lions in fenced  existence. I was strongly put to the test of my convictions last week when at my request Dr Peter Caldwell arrived to sterilise our lionesses. It had been an hypothetical decision up until that point. I had realised in January 2012 when I started working at a breeding farm and faced with a third litter of cubs, had decided that the ethical path forwards was to stop the breeding. I set about separating all breeding couples.

I then set about seeking a reason for the lions to live in that place, I sought justification for breeding judiciously, allowing one or two pairs to mate per year so as to keep the gene pool going. I read, researched and traveled to speak with scientists, vets , breeders and sanctuaries. I found no ethical excuse for breeding lions in captivity.

But quite aside from my quest for answers on an intellectual level, I can see for myself what the moral answer is. They should not be here, as good as this is, it is still not how lions should live.
I live with lions around me and I watch them everyday. The lions at Love Lions Alive Sanctuary are able to run and romp, they do have space to roam, rocks to climb on, private areas in which to  disappear and high ground from where they can survey their world.


But therein lies my heartache, this is their world, their whole world. I can drive off when I need a change of scenery. Unnaturally lions in captivity live inside enclosures with companions not necessarily of their choice. They live up against neighbours who in the wild they would either establish coalitions with or wage war against.

Hormonal turmoil rages unchecked by wire fences whilst the lion experiencing the primal desires for supremacy, sex or subservience is held captive by that fence. I watch happy lions and frustrated lions, they are sentient beings with moods and needs.

Spaying Natacha was a part of my mission statement. Spaying  Mela was putting my very heart on the line. Dr Caldwell asked me if I was alright after standing at Natcha's side throughout the operation. He didn't ask me what I felt after removing Mela's womb. I held her paw and stared out of the window.


The bigger picture. I will give a safe haven to any lion already existing in captivity whose quality of life can be improved by coming to LLA, but I can not watch new lions being created to live behind fences.

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