IDAHO FALLS, Idaho — Two 2-year-old African lion sisters at the Idaho Falls Zoo, Kamaria and Ilanga, headed to Seattle's Woodland Park Zoo this week to join the pride there.
The Post Register reports Hondo, the young male lion born at the zoo in 2017, will stay in Idaho Falls with his mother Kimani, who is 17 and past breeding age.
The average life expectancy of a captive lion is 15 to 20 years.
The tentative plan is when Kimani dies, the Species Survival Plan, a scientific committee that works with zoos to help preserve threatened and endangered species such as the African lion through breeding, will assign a mate or mates to the Idaho Falls Zoo to join Hondo.
Wild African lion numbers have fallen 40 percent over the past 30 years.
