Lion Farming

j LION FARMING By Elizabeth Cannon Porter "I want to raise two hundred lions a year," declared Charles Gay, lion farmer, "for the demand always exceeds the supply." (That sounds good to farmers.) "Where do we sell them? Why to circuses and zoos. There is always a good market for lions." At that it might be cheaper — and easier — to purchase lions from a "farm" than to catch them in the African jungle. How much do they bring? Roughly speaking, judging by the valuation put upon his young stock by M. Gay, they are worth about $1,000 apiece. Older ones average about $3000 — the price of a thoroughbred horse from Belgium. Individual specimens may run into a fortune. The owner would not put a price upon a nine-month- old lion that will make companions of birds, rabbits and children. It has never harmed anything, so would have great show value. Numa, an intelligent Abyssinian lion, has earned $40,000 for his owner by acting in moving pictures for the past four and a half years. A lioness has earned an equal amount in six years by giving birth to thirty-nine cubs during that time. She had two litters a year, numbering three and four infants apiece. She is fourteen years old. A lioness may have only one or two cubs, and, if she be young, may not paise them. The "farm" at the present boasts 74 head. It was started with a six-year-old lion and two slightly older lionesses, six years ago. The father is still a fierce and unmanageable brute, and is left pretty much alone. As the proprietor says: "There are trained lions, but never tame ones." So far there has been no competition, this being the only lion faim in the world. Nor do neighbors show a disposition to "crowd" it. A visitor would not care to stay overnighq in the place, despite stout wire enclosures. The roaring alone would shatter his nerves. Whatever their uses, one would not care to have a lion for a bedfellow. M. Gay is a Frenchman, lean, and long of limb. He has a swarthy complexion, gleaming teeth, and an arresting eye. Evidently he is not afraid of lions. Kipling, in his Jungle Book tellsi us that all wild animals fear the human eye. The intelligence back of it cows them. The one exception is the man-eating tiger. Occasionally he can look a man in the eye, and on that day he makes his kill. But the other animals do not like it when the tiger is man-hungry, for after a death come other men beating the brush and bringing the "red flower" (fire), of which all of the jungle folk are afraid. An African lion attacks from the front, usually tearing at a man's chest. We saw a trainer put half a dozen lions* through their paces

872 IMPROVEMENT ERA at one of the parks. He carried his arm in a sling. Six weeks before a sulky brute had leaped at him. With the lion's paws crushing his ribs, he had forced his fist down the beast's throat, while the lion's teeth closed on his forearm. One suspects that Charles Gay has> seen Algeria, if not the African Congo. He was doubtless a wild animal trainer before he took up the more peaceful occupation of raising lions. He is assisted by his English wife. M. Gay wears stiff leather leggings and armlets while putting the beasts through their paces, for he says, "The more they like you, the more they bite you." Rather a peculiar way of showing affection! "Gay's Lion Farm," located at El Monte, fifteen miles northeast of Los Angeles, reminds one of the South African veldt. It is sur- rounded by a rough-hewn picket fence surmounted by sharpened orange-colored staves. The low-lying house of African architecture is embedded in strange, exotic-looking tropical foliage. Doors are of heavy oak planks bound together with gleaming copper bands. Spa- cious interiors disclose capacious fireplaces and queerly designed rugs; one sinks into deep-cushioned seats. All is lighted with Oriental floor lamps of dull gold. The walls are adorned with trophies of the chase, heads of antelopex, zebra, and panther, interspersed with the crude war implements of the canabalistic tribes of the dark continent. Across the long center table sprawls an immense lion skin with ferocious-looking head. Even the dead animals are worth something, for a well-dressed pelt brings about $400. Even we whites like to prove the prowess of our hunters by hanging lion skins on our library walls, or stumble over fierce looking heads, with jaws agape, on our floors. The present lion farm was first opened to the public last July. A year ago its few acres were nothing but a plowed field. Even in so short a time the jungle has closed in on it — pepper trees and cocoanut, rubber and date palms, perfume-exuding magnolia and yellow Scotch broom, butterfly bush and cacti. A strutting purple peacock lends an exotic note of color. On entering the stockade the first lion that greets the visitor is little "Mary Christmas" in an elevated cage. She was born last Christ- mas day. She was not named "Santa Claus" because "she was not that kind of a lion," so the keeper says. She resembles a mangy dog and looks quite old in the face. The other two cubs of the triplets were killed by the mother when they were born. Mary was taken away from her, and, like the waif in Great Expectations, has been raised "by hand." She dutifully imbibes goat's milk and lime water, warmed, out of a bowl every few hours. The lions at the farm eat a horse a day. This is another use for the fa_st disappearing equine of the southwest, for the horse promises

LION FARMING 873 to vanish a second time from the North American continent. Variety in diet is furnished with a mule or a- goat. Lions are distinctly carniv- orous, but those born and raised in captivity, on a milk diet, amdist the society of man, are more docile than the imported variety. Left: The original of the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer trademark. A black-maned Nubian lion from the north of Africa. Right: Lion "kittens," playful and milk-fed. "Nelly," "Kelly" and "Mary Christmas." Leaving Mary, who can be fondled like a kitten, we pass to the enclosure housing the few-months-old youngsters. These look and act like clumsy St. Bernard dogs. They sharpen their teeth on tree trunks, gambol and play like destructive puppies. When they pinch M. Gay be lifts them by their tails, and sends them sprawling in another direction. A runt, mis-named "Hercules," was stepped on by his mother and had to have a slit sewed up in his side. "He is not quite recovered but entirely spoiled," says his keeper. The two show lions that have taken part in most of the animal pictures are housed together. There is the black-maned Nubian lion that furnished the trade mark for the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer pro- ductions. With him is Numa, high priced movie star. These two lions probably furnished the holocaust back-stage in the production of He Who Gets Slapped. Whenever they are "on location," their trainer accompanies them. Though visibly annoyed by an aeroplane

874 IMPROVEMENT ERA doing stunts overhead, he put them through their paces. Mrs. Gay lay on the ground while Numa twice walked over her prostrate form. Her husband wielded a whip while he held a three-pronged javelin in the other hand "for emergencies." None of the shivering tourists availed himself of the trainer's invitation to "come in and let the lion walk over you." The Mayer lion mounted a stump and extended his paws, right and left, as per request, enforced by the whip. In an adjacent field, with a high wire fence extending inwardly, so the agile brutes cannot leap over it, are the young stock which have been raised in captivity — magnificent specimens these. A lion reaches maturity at about five years, but does not attain his full growth until about eight years of age. They gain in weight at the rate of about a hundred pounds a year, though the most growth seems to come during the second year. A four-year-old lion will weigh about 400 pounds, a five-year lion about 500 pounds, a six-year-old lion 600 pounds — and still have two years to grow. These lions eat out of Mr. Gay's hand, will lick his hair, giving it a rough shampoo (if given the opportunity) and will let him ride on their backs. Agra measured nine feet when he stood on his hind legs by the side of his trainer. Tarzan, one of this group, was so named because he was born while they were working with the picture, "Tarzan of the Apes." Among these was* the five-year-old mother of "Mary Christmas." It is from this enclosure that the great bellowing comes. I Nearby is a pair of surly and uncertain temper. A railing is built around their domicile so the visitor will not come too close. In the outbuildings are iron cages where the lions, for various reasons, are put into solitary confinement, like bad prisoners. Occupy- ing the first three cages is Ulysses, a famous and handsome movie actor, the father of much of the young stock. He it was whom Mabel Normand led around on a string, thinking it was a dog, in one of her comedies. In the next cage was a lioness with her three five-day-old cubs the size of rabbits. She viewed the overseer with smoldering, malevo- lent eyes, perhaps thinking he had come for her young. The baby lions are usually taken away from the mother at from six to eight weeks. They get the mother into another cage and let down the hatch, before they dare remove them. In another building droops somnolent "Twilight," the ancestor of most of the lions on the place. She is "sweet sixteen," albeit a great-grandmother. Lions are considered old at 25 years, although some attain a ripe 35. Lions inclined to be quarrelsome are shut up. These cages connect with the different enclosures by means of runways, and they

LION FARMING 875 can be let out by the opening of trap doors, without the attendant going among them. Nine of these lions in a group represented an investment of $30,000. In a spacious garden are the yearlings, like Newfoundland dogs, but more agile. When a year old, the trained lion tender* begins to know the temper of his charges1, their special characteristics. "No two lions are alike," he will tell you. We pass a sylvan summer house with inviting seats of hewn logs, a la Krugerland, and come upon the smaller stockade of the two-year- olds. Its verdure is encased in wire netting against their claws. Thev are as large as calves, and much solider. They look ferocious enough. The keeper pats the straggly mane of one of them and informs us proudly that "He has six years yet to grow." It begins to rain and we are disappointed that we cannot have our pictures taken "with the lions." It is also five o'clock and the animals' dinner time. As we have conceived quite a good opinion of lions, it is just as well that we do not stop and see them eat. Honesty Humans in general are honest — fundamentally honest — especially when given a fair chance and placed on their honor. True, there are rascals in business, in clubs, even in chu rebec, but such persons are in the minority. In some cities newspapers are distributed daily in open receptacles on corners where the traffic is the heaviest, the publishers depending on customers to help themselves and to leave the proper amount of money in exchange. Rarely is this confidence violated. At Pacific Beach in Southern California, close to the paved highway, is an open front building. On a counter extending the full length of the room, every day in the year, are bouquets and baskets of everlasting flowers. Each bouquet and basket is plainly marked with a price tag. A large printed sign instructs the customers to take what they want and leave the money in a sealed jar provided for the purpose. This wayside "Flowerateria" has done a thriving business for more than two years. The owners say that the traveling public pay conscientiously for what they take and the money is deposited as effectively as if they remained in person to look after the sales which on some holidays have amounted to as much as fifty dollars. By this is proved that dishonesty is not nearly so prevalent as the pessimist would have us believe. San Diego, Calif. D. C. RETSLOFF.