While a liger will often inherit the sandy coloring and stripes of its parentage, liligers often develop rosettes similar to a leopard.

According to Wild Cats of the World (1975) by C. A. W. Guggisberg, ligers and tigons were long thought to be sterile, but in 1943, a 15-year-old hybrid between a lion and an 'Island' tiger was successfully mated with a lion at the Munich Hellabrunn Zoo.

The cub was named Kiara, and was born to an 8-year-old female liger, Zita, and a male African lion, Sam.

[7][failed verification] Craig Packer, director of the Lion Research Center at the University of Minnesota has said "In terms of conservation, it's so far away from anything, it's kind of pointless to even say it's irrelevant."

The Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA), the organization responsible for accrediting zoos in North America, neither approves of nor breeds the animals, because they focus on the conservation of wildlife and programs serving that purpose.