Saturday October 29, 2005
Nicky’s got two eligible suitors lined up
BY LEE YUK PENG
MALACCA: Nicky does not know it yet but the Malacca Zoo has lined up two male suitors for her to mate with next year.
Malacca Zoo director Mohd Nawayai Yasak said the five-month-old female cub would be sexually mature after she turns one.
He said the zoo would revive its tiger-breeding programme, starting with Nicky.
“Nicky was caught in the wild and is considered ‘new blood’. The rest of the captive-bred tigers are genetically too close,” he said yesterday.
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GREAT CAT-CH: Nicky, seen here with Malacca Zoo Animal Clinic staff member Fazrin Hashim Mustapha, will be ready to mate when she turns one. |
“We will place one of them with Nicky first and if they do not show any sign of aggression, we will proceed with the mating process.
“Otherwise, we will have to change partners,” he said.
The zoo’s Malayan tiger-breeding programme was suspended early last year when the tiger pens were demolished to make way for bigger and better enclosures.
The RM3mil project was scheduled for completion in January, said Mohd Nawayai.
“Tigers only mate for three to four days, then they go their separate ways,” he said.
He added that the zoo would also set up a webcam to enable the public to follow the mating process, and, if it were successful, the birth of the new cubs too.
Nicky, who was saved from the cooking pot by a Good Samaritan, was the latest addition to the tiger population at the zoo, which currently has 24 Malayan tigers – eight from the jungles, including Nicky, and the rest captive-bred.
Malacca Zoo’s tiger-breeding programme was started after a male tiger was caught in Puchong, Selangor, in 1987.
The zoo had its first tiger cub in 1991. Since then about 50 cubs have been born there.
The tiger cubs were given to other zoos in the country as well as those in the United States, Singapore, Germany and Vietnam under exchange programmes, said Mohd Nawayai.
Weighing more than 15kg now, Nicky was getting more aggressive by the day.
Mohd Nawayai Yasak said: “ Nicky will be a real tiger and she has begun to show the true colours of a tiger now.
“We are not training her to be a pet. She will never become a big domestic cat,” he said.
Mohd Nawayai said she would be trained to be wild and to be accepted by her male counterparts.
Though the two male suitors were bred in captivity, Nawayai said the male tigers would have no problem handling Nicky, even if she were a little “wilder” than them.
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