Pic of the Day May 28, 2008

In a zoo in California, a mother tiger gave birth to a rare set of triplet
tiger cubs. Unfortunately, due to complications in the pregnancy, the cubs
were born prematurely and due to their tiny
size, they died shortly after birth.

The mother tiger after recovering from the delivery, suddenly started to
decline in health, although physically she was fine. The veterinarians felt
that the loss of her litter had caused the tigress to fall into a
depression. The doctors decided that if the tigress could surrogate
another mother's cubs, perhaps she would improve.

After checking with many other zoos across the country, the depressing news
was that there were no tiger cubs of the right age to introduce to the
mourning mother. The veterinarians decided to try something that had never
been tried in a zoo environment. Sometimes a mother
of one species will take on the care of a different species. The only
orphans' that could be found quickly, were a litter of weanling pigs.
The zoo keepers and vets wrapped the piglets in
tiger skin and placed the babies around the mother tiger.