It bears the marks of both a lion and a tiger, yet it is fully neither. It looks calm, pacing its cage alone and lying down to rest when it tires, though now and then it lets out a loud roar when angered.

This was the scene recently at Ban Bilas Zoo in Khulna Cantonment, home to a special animal called a liger. It is the only liger in the country.

According to the zoo, a liger is an animal born from a cross between a male lion and a female tiger. Its name combines "li" from lion and "ger", the last part of tiger.

The rare animal was rescued by the Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) from smugglers in a border area of Bangladesh. At the time it was a sick cub only a few months old.

It was then kept at Ban Bilas Zoo in Khulna, where treatment and care nursed it back to health. It is now six years old and used to eating beef. The liger needs 5-8 kg of meat every day and weighs an estimated 200-220 kg.

Shafin Islam, who came to see the liger, said he had been seeing its photos on Facebook for several days, and was delighted to see it in person.

Visitor Ritu Khandaker said: "The liger is sitting quietly in the cage. It seems it wants to run. Sometimes it breathes with its mouth open, and it roars too. I like seeing it, but I also feel a little sad seeing it caged."

Jumman Islam told Jago News: "I came only to see the liger. Tigers scare me, but the liger didn't. It is very calm by nature."

Senior Warrant Officer Zakirul Islam, the official in charge of Ban Bilas Zoo, told Jago News that the liger has been there since its rescue and is very calm by nature.

He said boneless meat is bought for the liger every day and it is fed between 9.30am and 10.30am. Its enclosure is cleaned every morning so that it does not feel any discomfort.

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.