An unlikely friendship has blossomed between a tiger and a goat at a Russian safari park.
The goat was originally put in the Siberian tiger’s enclosure as his lunch, but the big cat refused to hunt him, leaving staff at the safari park ‘stunned’.
Amur the tiger has even been booted out of his shelter by the cheeky goat, who occupied his bed when he entered the enclosure, forcing Amur onto the roof.
A keeper at the safari park told The Siberian Times:
The goat showed no inkling of fear, eyeballed the tiger, and took over his shelter. Our tigers get live prey twice every week, and Amur knows very well how to hunt goats and rabbits. But recently he came across a goat that he refused to hunt.
According to the Daily Mail, the keepers have named the goat Timur – meaning iron – after seeing his balls of steel (or iron). One said: “We think that the goat had never come across tigers and so didn’t know that he should have been scared of them”.
Adding:
Amur the tiger is quite cautious by nature, and decided not to go to the trouble of hunting Timur. But the brave goat not only saved his own live. He also kicked the tiger out of his bedroom and is sleeping on Amur’s ‘bed’ for the fourth night.
According to the keepers the two animals appear to be good friends and take a daily walk together – Timur follows Amur, even though it appears to be the goat in charge.
