A lot of people are familiar with the white liger known as Hercules. The giant cat weighs over 900 pounds, is 11 feet tall standing on his hind legs, and is the Guinness World record holder for the largest cat. But many don’t know that Hercules is also the uncle to four adorable white tiger cubs, the first ever of their kind.
At the Myrtle Beach Safari in South Carolina, a male white lion named Ivory mated with a female white tiger named Saraswati. The result was four little bundles of mixed-breed cuteness, and they’re arguably the rarest cats on the planet.
White lions and white tigers are rare in and of themselves. There are only 300 and 1,200 in the world, respectively. There are currently about 1,000 ligers in the world, but none of them are from “white” lion or tiger parents, the Daily Mail noted.
According to the animals’ caretakers, at least one of the white tiger cubs is expected to rival Hercules’ size. At just 6 weeks old, the cubs weighed 15 pounds and were gaining a pound per day. Yeti is the largest, with a “big, fat head and paws,” Dr. Bhagavan Antle, who bred the cubs, said. “I am convinced Yeti will make the Guinness World Records.”
Meet Yeti, Odlin, Sampson, and Apollo, the world’s first white lion-white tiger hybrids.
The cubs with uncle Hercules. (Photo Credit: Barry Bland/Splash News)
At 2 years old, the cubs are estimated to be nearly 750 pounds, and the largest of them should be close to 900 pounds by age 4.
Apollo, the smallest of the litter, acts almost like a kitten, purring all of the time and always demanding to be pet.
See more photos of the cute litter of ligers below.
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