It can be a wrench giving up your comfort blanket – especially when you’ve had a particularly tough start in life. Lambert the African lion was illegally purchased by a family as a cub and kept as a pet. In June 2014, Vicky Keahey, founder of Texas’ In-Sync Exotics Wildlife Rescue and Educational Center received a call from the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries (GFAS) asking if she could take Lambert in. They were contacted by a private owner who had [illegally] purchased Lambert for his 2-year-old and 3-year-old children after going to see the movie The Lion King. “The little kids told their daddy they wanted a Simba, so he went out and bought them one.” But, after three months, the family decided they didn’t want Lambert anymore, so Vicky went to collect him. The family told her the cub was used to sleeping in bed with their grandfather, so when Lambert struggled to settle into his new home at the rescue centre, Vicky decided to introduce a comfort blanket. “I started thinking, ‘Okay, he’s used to being in a house, he’s used to sleeping in the bed with grandpa.’ So I got him a blanket, went into the enclosure and put the blanket in one of the corners,” Vicky recalls. “He curled up on that blanket and he went right to sleep. Ever since then, I always give him a blanket.” Lambert is now two years old and he’s grown considerably. He still lives with Vicky at the centre, because, sadly, he is too tame to be released back into the wild.
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