Ligers & Deformity – Myth or Reality?
Ligers do not have any kind of deformity or any such related medical condition. They are born normally and they stay normal throughout their lives. In medical terms a deformity is defined as a physical condition which leads to malformation or distortion from the normal physical attributes of an organism. Deformity can happen at the time of birth or later stages because of genetic malfunctioning. On the other hand; ligers are the hybrid big cats having physical characteristics comprising of a blend of both lions and tigers. According to liger experts; ligers have a hybrid physicality which is free of any malformation and physical defects. Ligers are born with hybrid vigor which makes them even much more powerful and stronger while the question of deformity is always out equation.
In our physical observations about ligers; we studied more than 100 ligers all over the world. We only found them bigger, stronger and more powerful than their parents. Hercules the liger which is the world’s biggest liger is an icon within Guinness Book of World Records and he is declared as the fittest, biggest and strongest of all the big cats on planet earth. Not only Hercules the liger; his 3 brothers Zeus, Vulcan and Sinbad the ligers are all physically very fit and no deformity is observed within them. Similarly; another famous liger named as Levi, who lives at Wynnewood zoo is also physically very strong and no such thing as deformity is observed within that liger as well. A female liger living at Russia’s Novosibirsk Zoo is also free of any deformity and she also gave birth to the world’s first Liliger cubs as well.
However; the only deformity which we witnessed within the liger was within a litter of liger cubs from Taiwan’s Pingtung Rescue Center. The only surviving liger of the three had a deformed leg and he struggled to walk normally. But behind this deformity of a liger there is a reason. If we look at the living conditions of its parents, where it was born one can definitely judge that the deformity was bound to be transferred to the liger cubs. The parents of those liger cubs were kept in a very small enclosure and even the owner of the big cats didn’t know that the tigress was pregnant. The sudden birth of the liger cubs sparked a huge criticism all around the world and questioned their birth defect but the news media failed to mention the deplorable condition in which the parents of the big cats were kept and later ligers were born. Inappropriate living conditions during pregnancy specifically impact the birth of the newborns and that impact can happen in the form of deformity within the newborns.
Animal Rights Activists always ambush on such negative news and they start promoting a literature which propagates that ligers are born with deformity. The same thing happened in Taiwan as well, when the liger cubs were born many Animal Rights Activists were all over the media stating all the negative lies about ligers which also focused on deformity. Recently PETA has also launched a campaign against ligers and previously Big Cat Rescue has launched a paid advertising campaign on Google and Facebook Advertisements against ligers. But in reality all their claims regarding the health and deformity issues within the ligers are a complete set of lies.
Dr. Bhagavan Antle who runs Myrtle Beach Safari is a big advocate of the ligers. He has more than 30 years of experience with ligers and has raised almost one dozen ligers. According to Dr. Bhagavan Antle, ligers in terms of their physical strength are much more powerful than their parents. They have a huge body size with enormous body structure and they are the fittest cat on planet earth. Dr. Bhagavan Antle also rubbishes all the issues of deformity within ligers and classifies them as nothing more than merely a myth. His ligers have twice appeared within Guinness Book of World Records and on numerous times his ligers have appeared on National Geographic, Animal Planet and other mainstream media channels.
Similarly; Joe Schreibvogel is the only person in the world to have successfully bred 4 different kinds of hybrid big cats. These four hybrids include Ligers, Liligers, Tiligers and an L3 Liger which is a male lion and a female liliger crossbred. According to Joe Schreibvogel millions of dollars are spent in advertisements to convince the people that ligers and other hybrid animals have genetic diseases and deformities but they are all based on lies. According to Joe; the hybrid animals such as ligers are much healthier and stronger than the purebred animals. Furthermore; they are genetically very strong and free of any deformity within them.
