Happy birthday to a lion lover! There's plenty of people in my life who are closely associated with "their animal", and he's one of them. This man has always loved lions, and even kind of looks like one, I guess!
At the age of three of four, lions reach maturity, some female lions remain with their pride while others must find new prides or become solitary lionesses. All male lions must leave the pride at three years old. Many remain solitary with little opportunity to mate while others devote their adulthoods to attempting to take over a pride. Adult lions may form alliances to strengthen their efforts to conquer a pride. If successful, the new pride leaders often kill the young cubs in the pride to facilitate mating with the lionesses.
Lions in the wild rarely survive longer than eight or 10 years. Wild lions most commonly succumb to injuries resulting from attacks by humans or other lions or defensive wounds from prey animals. While in captivity, lion lifespan may extend to 25 years or longer.
In the past decade there have been multiple reports of lions living to be 25. There are reports of a lion living to be 29, but no information is given other than an age.
