News Archive

Let me start by thanking everyone on behalf the staff here at Great Cats for the outpouring of sympathy and kind wishes we received on the loss of our girl, Soyono. You made a very difficult time much easier to bear and we appreciate it more than we can say. We had the opportunity to spoil her...

Longtime followers of the tigers here at National Zoo are familiar with Soyono. She is our older female Sumatran tiger, and for years she and her mate Rokan formed our breeding pair. Soyono was born here in Washington in June of 1993 and has spent all of her long life here, becoming the oldest...

Hurricane Sandy has come and gone here and the cats and keepers weathered the storm with no problems. On Sunday, the day before the rain started, we cleaned out gutters and drains, raked leaves, and placed sandbags at the doors. While we certainly got a lot of rain, it did not come all at once as it...

The cats got a present! Port City Brewery in Alexandria, Virginia generously donated some kegs for the cats to use as toys. It's not easy to find things that can stand up to being played with by tigers and lions, but beer kegs are (almost) indestructible. The lions have discovered that if you whack...

First of all, here is a Guntur update for all his many fans. He is doing very well in Zoorasia and has made his big debut. It rained for his first public appearance in Yokohama, but since his name means "thunder" this was taken as a good sign. Those of you who have been following Guntur from the...

Guntur is officially the newest resident of Zoorasia in Yokohama, Japan! Guntur was sent there last week on a breeding recommendation with a female tiger that they have from Holland. As his keepers, we are all very sad to see him go, but we are excited that he will get the opportunity to increase...

It's official! Guntur will be leaving soon and going to Zoorasia in Yokohama, Japan. There is a young female there who was recommended as a breeding partner for Guntur. She is not related to any tigers in the USA, and Guntur is not related to any tigers in Japan, so this is really an excellent match...

Everything went very smoothly with Guntur's move to Japan. He went right into his crate without any hesitation and seemed quite comfortable there. He did object when people got too close to his crate, but other than that he lay in his hay and waited to see what in the world was going on. As always...

Having grown up in San Diego, Damai is experiencing her first real winter this year. We are glad that so far the weather has been relatively mild. Visitors often ask if we put the cats out in the winter. While Sumatra doesn't have the cold weather that we have here, our Sumatran tigers do adapt to...