Tiger, tiger, burning.....dead!

What it must be like to be a tiger in a zoo I do not know. Of all the big cats, this animal is the least keen on domestic life and public gaze. The very thought of hanging about in a metal cage with a concrete floor is probably the last thing a tiger thinks of as desirable living arrangements.

A lion may decide that lazily gawping at an adoring public is reasonably tolerable, but a tiger is not so well disposed. A rare white tiger has mauled to death a New Zealand zoo keeper as horrified tourists looked on. Horrified by what exactly? The mauling or the fact that the tiger had probably had enough of it all? I find it all too terrible. A zoo keeper is dead and this is a terrible tragedy. But so is the tiger dead. Put down because his natural instincts just got too much for him. He can't be allowed to get too tigerish! And another rare animal bites the dust.

The message for the animals is just grin and bear it. You can't be roaming around in the wild anymore but please, when you get a decent home, don't get so wild with frustration that you do something stupid. Who'd be a tiger today!