虎狮种

因栖境跟行为的不同，虎狮兽不会自然产生。就如狮虎兽，虎狮兽也有其父母的混合特征，如兼有狮子的斑点和老虎的条纹，吼叫声兼有亲种的特征，雄虎狮兽会有较狮子小的鬃毛。但与狮虎兽不同的是，老虎控制体型生长的基因是由公虎遗传的，狮子控制体型生长的基因却是由母狮遗传，所以公虎母狮交配生下的虎狮兽只能长到与其父母相当的体型，而不会像狮虎兽般体型比狮或虎都要硕大。

在生育力方面，普遍认为大部分的狮虎兽混种为不育，雄性虎狮兽皆不育，但雌性虎狮兽比雄性狮虎兽有较高的几率具有繁殖力。它们可与雄狮交配产生狮虎兽狮或与雄虎产生虎虎狮兽。

虎狮最早出现在1799年的印度。当时有些英国的官员想知道老虎和狮子能不能交配，和它们的后代是什么样子。1799年，英国人成功地让一只雄虎和一只母狮交配，并且生下3只小虎狮，赠送给维多利亚女皇。

狮虎兽和虎狮兽极其罕见。有关资料显示，目前世界上存活的狮虎兽、虎狮兽只有8－10只。

The tigon also called tiglion, tigion, and tion is a hybrid offspring of a male tiger (Panthera tigris) and a female lion, or lioness (Panthera leo). They exhibit visible characteristics from both parents: they can have both spots from the mother (lions carry genes for spots – lion cubs are spotted and some adults retain faint markings) and stripes from the father. Any mane that a male tigon may have will appear shorter and less noticeable than a lion's mane and is closer in type to the ruff of a male tiger.

Tigons do not exceed the size of their parents' original species because they inherit growth-inhibitory genes from both parents, but they do not exhibit any kind of dwarfism or miniaturization; they often weigh around 180 kg (400 lb). It is distinct from the reciprocal cross, the liger, which is a hybrid of a male lion and a female tiger, often weighing from 320 kg (710 lb) to 550 kg (1,210 lb).

Fertility

Ligers and tigons were long thought to be sterile; in 1943, however, a 15-year-old hybrid between a lion and a tiger was successfully mated at the Munich Hellabrunn Zoo. The female cub was then raised to adulthood. Like the liger, male tigons are sterile while the females are fertile.

At the Alipore Zoo in India, a tigoness named Rudhrani, born in 1971, was successfully mated to a male Asiatic lion named Debabrata. The rare, second-generation hybrid was called a litigon. Rudhrani produced seven litigons in her lifetime. Some of these reached impressive sizes - a litigon named Cubanacan weighed at least 363 kg (800 lb), stood 1.32 m (4 ft 4 in) at the shoulder, and was 3.5 m (11 ft) in total length.

Coexistence of parental species

As with the liger, the tigon is found only in captivity, because the habitats of the tiger and lion do not overlap. In the past, however, the Asiatic lion did coexist with the Bengal tiger in the wilderness of India, besides occurring in countries where the Caspian tiger had been, such as Iran and Turkey. In India, there is a plan to shift some lions from their current home of the Gir Forest to Kuno Wildlife Sanctuary, which has some tigers, but it has not been implemented as of December 2017, perhaps due to political reasons, as the Gujarat state government does not want any other state to have lions in the forests.