This is the story of two lions. Bella the lioness we rescued from Romania five years ago, and Simba a male released from a French
circus and then taken to a Belgian sanctuary. Recently, Simba made the journey from
Europe to Malawi in the heart of Africa.
At the Lilongwe Wildlife Centre, Simba found a safe haven and for the
first time in his life also experienced company of a lioness. Born Free felt these two magnificent lions had been
without a companion for too long. "We've had a female here now for some
considerable time. She's been very lonely and so we decided,
as we had the opportunity to rescue Simba, we thought this would be the ideal moment to bring him over give her
a mate." But the course of true love doesn't
always run smooth. Bringing solitary lions together can be exceedingly dangerous. "We're all here for the obvious reason
that we're going to try and integrate these two lines tomorrow. There are a few criteria that we have to
ahere to. The first one is lions can change very
quickly, as you can hear." Despite his life if captivity, Simba is in his prime. Bella hasn't been so
fortunate and her body bears the scars of her early
captive life. "She has one eye missing. She has a spinal deformity and she is twelve-years-old, so she's getting on.
Born Free and always wanted her to have a mate, and she's been quite lonely here for the
last few years. One of things that we have to take into consideration is when and how we intervene. It might
look pretty horrendous to you what's going on in there, and I'm telling you to lay off. The fact is,
I've got to make my mind up as to when they start to really hurt
each other and when they just posturing and playing around, making an awful noise." "What is the plan?
We've actually got two plans. in Malawi in general are almost
extinct, they're not a lot anymore in the wild in Malawi as well. These two lions would be
perfect ambassadors for lions in Malawi." "There's an awful lot riding on tomorrow, not the least for the animals, who've been waiting to have mates for some considerable time and all the supporters of Born Free and of course, the staff are hoping this wind up with a
really happy ending. But, tomorrow is the moment of truth." Today, Simba is going to into Bella's night room. This will be the first time that the pair will be in the same
enclosure. "Does anyone know how long it takes for a lion to do 100 metres?" For Tony and his team, it's make-or-break day. "Usain Bolt can run 100 meters in under
10 seconds, these lions are capable of doing it in 4! So, we have to have great respect that there is no way we can run away from them. We have to make sure that we're secure all the time." It is vital that every precaution is put in place. "We have a couple a fire extinguishers
just in case the lions actually do start a big
fight with each other and we had we need something to split them up. Of course, we can go in and yelling or
anything, it won't make any difference. With a fire extinguisher we can put huge water pressure on them and hopefully it will
scare them enough to actually split up. As
long as they are separated again they hopefully will be fine." "You're all ready to accept what we're going to do? You all understand that there is a risk? We take more precautions to see that there's no more we can do; everything seems to be right for the introduction. always quite nervous of being
introduced to males, because they're very inferior in
strength. Males can kill female large very easily,
so although he's very laid back and he's
doing everything we want, when we open the gate and she actually is in his face; that
is the the moment of truth." Tony knows that the time is right. Tony's raised hand is all that's
coming between the tussling Lions and a blast from the fire
extinguishers. Bella's turn to make the first move "She's not rushing back to him so that's good. We might just let him go back for tonight and try again in the morning. So, we haven't the perfect scenario of two lions together, so what we're going to do,
tomorrow morning we're going to come back and do a much softer introduction by releasing her into the
outside, opening his den and letting him follow her.
We feel that outside will give them a more natural advantage and make them feel more relaxed." Once bitten, twice shy, Simba refuses to venture outside. are lions which for most of their lives have been alone. Simba has never, ever met another female, probably in his whole life. This is actually the first time he has met a female, so it's not very strange that he takes his time" A new day and Tony has a new plan. "The only way we can get him to come
outside was to let him go out into his
territory first. We then released her into his territory. So, we took a chance and the result is this." "We have a situation where the animals
laying, probably less than 3 meters appart and although I'm there is tension there..." "This is a natural progression to lions becoming accustomed to each
other. I'm exceedingly happy and so are all the staff at Lilongwe and it appears that it's all going to turn out really well." As the days and weeks pass since Bella & Simba first met, their
relationship continues to evolve at their own pace. Everyone is working to
ensure they both continue to enjoy the tranquility and space their new African home the way at its best for them.
