Baby Tigers!

Boris

Last week at the beach we played with baby tigers at the Alabama Gulf Shores Zoo!

We are all cat lovers, so when we heard about this opportunity, we were like YES, SIGN ME UP. NOW. (Funny thing: baby tigers are featured in my book DON'T FEED THE BOY ... I'm just a little later getting the actual experience. :)

And it was so much fun. They were playful, even in the heat, and reminded us all much more of puppies than kittens. We learned that once they reach 35 pounds, they cannot be handled by people the way we handled them. So it really was a precious time. Here are 6 week old cubs Boris and Sonya together:

Here's a pic of Sonya displaying the "false eyes" on the back of the tiger's ears that serve to warn off predators (because it looks like the tiger is staring them down.)

Below are some more shots of our family enjoying our time with the cubs... the only instructions we were given (aside from wear long pants, long sleeves, shoes-n-socks) were to not pick them up or restrain the cubs in any way:

They loved biting at Eric's hair!

Tug-o-war.

mmm...snack time

my, what big paws you have...

Ball or ice, ball or ice?

Toy!

Retreating to the coolest corner...

 Finally, the babies got tired, as babies do... and we left them to lounge around with each other. :)