King of the zoo: liger cub Tsar is Russian hit

A picture taken on January 26, 2017 shows a travelling zoo keeper holding a two and a half months old liger cub, Tsar, a crossbreed between a lion and a tigress, in the town of Kamensk-Shakhtinsky in Russia's Rostov region. -AFP

ROSTOV-ON-DON, RUSSIA: His name is fit for a king, and he’s being treated like one: Tsar the liger cub, born from an extremely rare lion-tiger romance, is proving a hit for a travelling Russian zoo.

Stretched out in the zoo director’s van, the stripy Tsar -- whose name is a throwback to the Russian emperors of centuries past -- impatiently awaits his milk bottle.