When Kevin Richardson decided to cool off in the sweltering South African heat he was joined by an unlikely swimming partner - a giant lioness .

But before you fear a bloody ending, don't... because these two are good friends .

Zoologist and animal behaviourist Kevin, 34, raises and interacts with some of the most dangerous animals known to man .

With his unusual methods, Kevin has developed some exceptionally personal bonds with his students, playing, sleeping and even swimming with animals .

Taking a well-deserved break in the Crocodile River, just south of the Magaliesburg mountains, Kevin was joined by Meg the lioness .

Weighing a staggering 185 kg this boisterous tawny lioness playfully splashed around with the veteran of the wild ..

'We went swimming purely for Meg's enrichment,' Kevin said .

'That's one of the reasons I believe my animals are so relaxed. They live very enriched lives .

'Those who like it go for swims, others go for walks in the greater area and others just prefer to go and chill under a tree in the middle of the park '.

Meg, seven, and her sister Amy, live in The Kingdom Of The White Lion, near Johannesburg, South Africa .

Lions, hyenas and leopards reside in the 650-hectare area not too far from the banks of the river .

The Kingdom Of The White Lion help to fund predator research in Botswana and are actively involved in creating awareness around the globe .

Kevin, who has been involved in countless documentaries and has just finished working on a new film about white lions, works to create awareness and being active in lion conservation .

With lion numbers in the wild dropping from around 350,000 animals to 25-30,000 animals over a period of 15 years, the statistics paint a grim picture .However Kevin's unusual work with these magnificent animals has captured the imagination .

'People are always amazed that she doesn't rip me to pieces with her claws,' Kevin said .'I assure you every now and again I get a claw going into me. It's unintentional and just reconfirms to me how gentle and in control she tries to be .

'She gets like an excited dog going for a ride in a car. She takes no coaxing to get her to swim .

'You get in and start swimming and the next thing you know there's a full grown lioness beside you doing doggy....umm I mean.... Lion paddle towards you

Imagine how long these men had to stand in that one

spot to set it up correctly .

This is INCREDIBLE ! The picture was taken in

1918 .It is 18,000 men

preparing for war in a training camp at Camp

Dodge in Iowa .

Picture of 100ft-long 'snake' sparks fears of mythical monster in Borneo .

According to legend, the Nabau was a terrifying snake more than 100ft in length and with a dragon's head and seven nostrils .

But now local villagers living along the Baleh river in Borneo believe the mythical creature has returned after

this photo of a gigantic snake swimming along the remote waterways has emerged .

The picture, taken by a member of a disaster team monitoring flood regions by helicopter, has sparked a huge debate about whether the photos are genuine or merely the work of photo-editing software .

Borneo's Nessie: The image that sparked fears a giant serpent was stalking the river Baleh

Even the respected New Straits Times newspaper in Kuala Lumpur has asked readers to make up their own minds about the photos .

Villagers who claim to have seen the snake say they have given it the name of Nabau, after an ancient sea serpent which can transform itself into the shapes of different animals .

People who have studied the photograph of the shape taken from the air have dismissed suggestions that it's a log.

As one writer asked: 'A log can't be that winding, can it'? Others have suggested it's a speedboat, but this has been dismissed because of the twisting wake .

The most common accusation is that the photo has simply been manipulated on a computer, while others complain that the river is a different colour to the real Baleh rover which is a murky brown .

Mythical: A second frame appears to show something snake-like in the water off a remote village

But villagers who insist the snake exists say that photos of the creature being taken in different parts of the river prove it is swimming about .

Earlier this month scientists unearthed the fossil of a killer snake that was longer than a bus, as heavy as a small car and which could swallow an animal the size of a cow .

The 45ft long monster - named Titanoboa - was so big that it lived on a diet of crocodiles and giant turtles, squeezing them to death and devouring them whole .

Weighing an impressive 1.25 tons, it slithered around the tropical forests of South America 60million years ago ,

just five million years after the last dinosaurs were wiped out .

Partial skeletons of the boa constrictor-like prehistoric killer were found in a Colombian coal mine by an international team of fossil hunters .