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Elephant Swimming Pool Installed At Japan's Fuji Safari Park

You Haven't Lived Until You've Seen An Elephant Happily Swimming Laps
Eve Hartley

A safari park in Japan has opened up a elephantine swimming pool for its resident pachyderms.

The attraction was established to allow visitors to examine how the mammals use their legs to swim and reveals how they use the very tips of their trunks to breathe.

At least one thing is for sure... they are already equipped with trunks!

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The mammals are enjoying the new pool

The new pool, at Fuji Safari Park, measures at 65 meters in length and is displayed in a transparent arena.

Officials claim that the elephants eat far more now the lido has been installed and they often swim up to three laps a day.

Footage of the tusked herbivores shows them happily paddling up and down the length of the pool.

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Daki Takachi, a spokesperson for the park said: "This new facility we built allows people to see what happens underwater, enabling us to understand how the Elephants use their legs to swim.

"(And) how they emerge their nose to the tip of the water to breathe. It's really surprising."

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Baby lion cubs can be cuddled by visitors at the zoo

The zoo has also gained media attention for having a somewhat controversial petting zone, where lion cubs as young as three weeks old can be picked up and cuddled.

Photographs are taken of the visitors holding the cubs, although the lions get tired very quickly and often have their eyes shut.

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Wild Asian Elephants, Elephas maximus in Khao Yai national park(01 of45)
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Wild Asian Elephants, Elephas maximus in Khao Yai national parkThis photo is published under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike Licence.You are free to use this image, but only with attribution under the same licence together with the following credits:Owner: Tontantravel.comLink: http://www.tontantravel.com/tours/en/khao-yai-tours.html (credit:Tontan Travel Thailand/500px)
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This is a libre photo. Feel free to copy it, to modify it, to use it as you want, as long as you say my name and give the same freedom to your public (whenever it is a modified version of my photo or not). For more details about what you can and cannot do, please read the Free Art License: http://artlibre.org/licence/lal/en/ (credit:Alexandre Ultré/500px)
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