Mystery Cheetah Illness Baffles Zookeepers | The Secret Life of the Zoo | Nature Bites

One of the cheetahs at Chester Zoo has mysteriously taken ill. The keepers must race to find out what's wrong and treat the illness before it's too late...
From The Secret Life of the Zoo Season 3 Episode 3: A new female chimp arrives at Chester Zoo, the runt of the otter litter goes missing, and cheetah mother Kinky Tail is on the operating table.
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#TheSecretLifeOfTheZoo #cheetah #bigcats #wildlife #animals

[@angelesmith4447]

She looks like How dare you knock me out..and take me away from my daughter..lol..

[@alezot6141]

While female cheetahs often live in solitude, males (usually brothers) often form coalitions. After lions, male cheetahs they are the most social wild cats

[@DustyHoney]

We’re learning more and more that mountain lions are pretty social. While they usually hunt alone, they gather in large groups around water sources. They groom eachother, and have friends.

[@mightabeenking]

I don't think fifteen minutes is a long time. It's not like they heard the microwave beep. LOL

[@prairierider7569]

Fun fact, there used to be a North American cheetah, the antelope here are fast for a reason

[@Mistfall254]

That cat is more like the modern Cougar than the African cheetah atleast the newest paleontological papers on it says

[@AlienChicken]

Is it really that expesive to get live chickens for a zoo?

[@alezot6141]

Zoos generally don't use live food for their large carnivores, for multiple reasons. 1) The prey may fight back, injuring the carnivore; 2) Live animals have inherently less sanitary control compared to dead ones; 3) There are many ways to stimulate the foraging behaviour of carnivores without tossing a live animal into an enclosure.
The only live prey given live in zoos are usually insects and other invertebrates, because in many insectivores it's the food movement to trigger the hunting response.

[@DustyHoney]

Cheetas don’t eat chickens.

[@DustyHoney]

Also, cheetas won’t eat meat that’s touched the ground.

[@CraftyZanTub]

@@DustyHoney Cheetahs do on occasion eat birds. Chicken is just a different sort of bird.

[@CraftyZanTub]

@@DustyHoney That is why the Cheetahs get their chicken served in branches off the ground.

[@justincronkright5025]

The concept of eating whilst you're giving food... Does that not seem right (as in for training & bonding purposes)?
Or is there much evidence to suggest that it's just not correct with every animal perhaps - dogs & social species yes... but prancers such as felines would be a no though maybe.

[@alezot6141]

Modern training uses a method called positive reinforcement - you give a reward (usually food) associated to a visual or auditory clue for perfoming a certain behavior. Zoos nowadays tend to be big on this type of training, because it raises the welfare of the animals in more than one way. Pretty much any kind of animal can be trained; social animals tend to respond more readily I believe, but more solitary animals also learn just fine. The success of the training usually it's down to the individuals (both animals and humans), rather than the species.

[@justincronkright5025]

@@alezot6141 Yes I just meant in terms of creating a deeper bond (which in many cases may not be a good thing to develop) - thinking of single care-giver situations. So if that care-giver for example happens to pass away or go on leave for a while, etc. The animal might be in distress due to that main care-giver's absence.
My focus was on the perceived notion of 'group/social eating' I guess it might be called. I suspect it would never do anything special for most 'more' solitary animals such as these. But 1/1000 could be of the sort that bonds more deeply/creates a deeper connection to a person feeding them (who is eating or performing another action at the same time that positively reinforces the connections.
Again it wouldn't necessarily be good to do this with all of the endangered animals I suspect. As even taking out 1 of the potential breeding partners, if they were to get too separated emotionally or cognitively from their fellows might be a blow to their genetic foundations going forward.

[@alezot6141]

@@justincronkright5025 An important part of modern zoo management is that animals are given social groups more similar to those seen in the wild; for the most part, keepers do not substitute the social group, they are an additional part to it.
It is also quite rare for zoo animals to be cared for by a single keeper. In the case of potentially dangerous animals, the presence of multiple keepers on the workplace is often required by law.

[@teddyl7006]

I don't like this. I've seen zoos who handle Cheetahs in a much better way.

[@DustyHoney]

They called cheetahs big cats, which they are not. So you might have a point.

[@christinemcleod5499]

I think they like to chase there food. I don’t know how they could do that in that small area.

[@rajaking8400]

STOP STEALING OUR WILDLIFE!!! WE CAN SEE IT IN OUR BEAUTIFUL ANIMALS EYES THAT THEY DON'T WANT TO BE LOCKED UP IN YOUR ZOO'S IN YOUR LANDS FOR YOUR SO CALLED, ENTERTAINMENT, THEY WANT TO BE BACK IN THEIR REAL HOME WHICH THEY WILL BE ONE DAY, TRUS!!!!