cute lion cubs .

first trio of lion cubs to arrive at cotswold wildlife park ,bedford,oxfordshire in 46 years .parents rana and lioness kana are 5 years old and cubs are kali,sita,sonika.

Thousands of jellyfish wash up on North Devon beach... but are they dangerous?

A woman was surprised find "thousands" of jellyfish washed up on a North Devon beach this week.

Helen Orpen took to social media to share her shock at the sheer number of the gelatinous critters that had been marooned on Woolacombe beach on Tuesday.

Helen wrote: "Did anyone see the jellies on Woolacombe beach today? Never seen so many."-read more

Wild dogs move into new homes at Exmoor Zoo

Rare endangered African wild dogs have set up home at Exmoor Zoo after three years of work to bring them to North Devon.

The painted or hunting dog is instantly recognized for its unique coat patterns, but it is also verging on extinction.

Danny Reynolds, one of the partners at the zoo near Bratton Fleming said: “This wild dog of Africa has got to be potentially one of the most likely species of dogs to become extinct in the wild in the near future.

“With less than 1,200 breeding adults alive and these animals scattered in segmented groups across sub-Sahara Africa in packs isolated from one another, time is beginning to run out for the hunting dogs.”

The Exmoor dogs are three sisters from Port Lympne Wildlife Park in Kent and are about one-and-half years old.

The zoo’s curator Derek Gibson added: “Today’s role of a zoo is not just to exhibit animals but the right animals, those that need the effort of all of us to be able to stay alive in the near future.

“This is why we have joined the European Association of Zoos & Aquaria (EAZA) as well as our British counterpart the British Association of zoos & Aquaria (BIAZA). By doing this and complying with their requirements as well as our -read more

Lion 'on the loose in Cornwall' sparks police hunt

T

he police force that spent weeks looking for a missing lynx are now searching for an even bigger cat after a lorry driver claimed he spotted - a lion.

Officers in Devon and Cornwall say they have carried out a search for a female lion after a trucker said one jumped out in front of his vehicle.

Police officers who went to look for the animal even found giant paw prints.read more

Dinosaur diagnosed with severe arthritis - 70 million years after its death

Researchers have diagnosed a dinosaur with ‘severe’ arthritis - 70 million years after its death. Scientists led by a researcher from the University of Manchester analysed a fossilised elbow joint from a hadrosaur type of dinosaur and concluded it must have endured considerable suffering before it died. It’s believed to be the first ever recorded account of septic arthritis in dinosaurs. Hadrosaurs were plant-eating, duck-billed dinosaurs common in parts of Europe, Asia, and North America and ranged in size from 10ft to 40ft long. There are many different types of named dinosaur within the family.-read more

Diary reveals Hitler’s henchman Heinrich Himmler enjoyed a back rub before killings… and nearly fainted when victim’s brain spattered on his clothes

IT could be any businessman’s desk diary, with its neatly typed lists of mundane appointments, travel arrangements and lunch meetings. But Heinrich Himmler’s business was genocide. The former chicken farmer was the head of the SS, put in charge of the Holocaust byAdolf Hitler and the creator of the system of extermination camps where millions of people were murdered.

His office diaries, lost for 71 years, have now been discovered lying in a Russian military archive.

And the sheer banality of the entries provides a chilling insight into the life of a doting father who started each day with a massage before heading off to organise the nitty-gritty of mass murder.-read more

Cannabis cavemen: Did our ancestors smoke weed back in the Stoned Age?

Scientists have discovered a tribe of modern-day hunter gatherers smoked cannabis to ward off parasites - suggesting ancient humans may also have had a taste for the high life. The Aka people are a pygmy tribe from the Congo Basin, living a life of foraging which is little different from our ancestors. But more than half of the men have a cannabis habit which would put Snoop Doggy Dogg to shame. "In the same way we have a taste for salt, we might have a taste for psychoactive plant toxins, because these things kill parasites," said Dr. Edward Hagen, who published a report on his research in the American Journal of Human Biology. He found tribespeople who used cannabis had a lower rate of infection from parasitic worms, suggesting they "unconsciously" used the drug medicinally-read more