Lion Goes Viral With His Bizarre Hairstyle; Zoo Authorities Insist He Styled Himself
A male lion at Guangzhou Zoo in southern China has caused a stir on social media due to its bizarre hairstyle. The white lion, named Hanghang, was spotted sporting a fringe hairstyle over the weekend, sparking outrage from people who accused the zoo authorities of disheveling his exotic look.
Pictures of the lion surfaced on various social media platforms after a visitor to the Guangzhou Zoo saw the lion with the unusual haircut, took a picture, and shared it on a Chinese social media platform, the Little Red Book (Xiaohongshu).
Authorities at the Guangzhou Zoo were compelled to make a statement after photos of Hanghang's bizarre hairstyle went viral on social media. While some people found the hairstyle amusing, others demanded to know why they had ruined the lion's natural appearance.
However, the zoo denied the allegations that they had given the lion the haircut. "We would never dare to cut his hair," one zoo worker reportedly said.
The worker explained that the lion's fringe hairstyle was most likely caused by the heat and high humidity in Guangzhou. Hanghang arrived at Guangzhou Zoo in 2015 from Hangzhou in eastern China's Zhejiang province.
According to the zoo worker, his hair started falling straight due to Guangzhou's high humidity.
Guangzhou is one of the largest cities in China, with a population of over 18 million.
The city is located in a subtropical monsoon climate zone, making its weather warm and humid all year round. Summers in Guangzhou are long, humid, and hot, while winters are short, mild, and sunny.
The Guangzhou Zoo authorities said Hanghang must have groomed himself by licking his paws and pawing his fur, resulting in the fringe hairstyle.
"There is no hairdressing program at the zoo, and we dare not cut a lion's hair. You can say that he has 'designed' the hairstyle himself," the zoo authorities said in an interview with Global Times.
Lions spend a significant amount of time daily licking themselves clean, much like house cats do. However, the goal is not just to get clean but also to remove as much of their scent as possible so that prey won't notice their presence.
In the wild, for instance, if a lion lies in wait and an antelope gets a whiff of the lion's scent, it will run away.
So lions groom themselves to eliminate any smell that may give them away. Despite the Guangzhou Zoo authorities' best efforts to refute the accusation that they were responsible for giving Hanghang the fringe haircut, some Chinese social media users insist they are to blame.
According to one user, when they visited the zoo less than a week ago and saw the lion, he did not have a fringe hairstyle.
What do you think?
This is not the first time an animal has made headlines for sporting an unusual haircut. In 2020, a Tamil Nadu temple elephant became a sensation on the internet after she was photographed with a bob-cut hairstyle.
Netizens named her "Bob-cut Sengamalam," and thousands of people flocked to the Rajagopalaswamy Temple in Mannargudi, India, to see her.
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