Asani is the new male lion at the Roosevelt Park Zoo. He comes to Minot from New Orleans.

The Roosevelt Park Zoo has received a male and two female African lions via the African Lion Species Survival Plan (SS), zoo staff announced this week.

The trio recently was cleared from quarantine and staff has begun shifting them throughout the lion building. The male, named Asani, was born at the Audubon Zoo in New Orleans Louisiana, on Jan. 11, 2020. The female sisters, Ilola and Tadala, were born Aug. 17, 2020, at the Dallas Zoo in Texas.

The Roosevelt Park Zoo was asked to breed one of the females. Lions reach sexual maturity at two years old and mate at all times of the year. The gestation period is 102-112 days, which usually results in two to five cubs.

The females are housed together while the male is housed separately. The trio will be introduced to one another within the next few months once warmer temperatures enable them to have more room to sort out differences, according to the zoo. However, guests will have opportunities to see them separately as cats are shifted to different spaces, such as the day room and in the outside enclosure on warmer days.

The SSP did not recommend any move for Kiota, the zoo’s lone male African lion, due to his age. For his safety, Kiota will be managed separately from the trio and will split outdoor time with the group.

Kiota was born at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoological Park in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on Aug. 25, 2005. His long-time companion Jasira, died in early 2022.