African Lions

At both the Calgary and Naples Zoos there were railings between the observer and the wire fences, which stopped me from getting close to the wire mesh of the lion enclosures. Luckily the big cats were fairly far from the fence so I was able to get a few images without the wire mesh interfering too much.

When I was a boy, the male lion had the reputation of being the "King of the Jungle", which was odd, since lions live on the African Savannah not in the jungle. I liked the close-up image of the male lion, which I took in the Naples Zoo. As a crowd gathered around its enclosure this large lion lifted its head as it sniffed the air and it had the air of "royalty" as it totally ignored us.

The two females in the other images were in the Calgary Zoo and when I arrived they were resting, which isn't conducive to making interesting images. I waited a while and was happy to see one of them get up and walk around a bit. As she approached another female that was lying on the grass, they greeted each other and I made an image at that moment.

Feel free to check out more photos of lions at: http://www.lanephotography.com/animals/african_lion/African_Lions.htm