THREE tiger cubs born at Marwell Zoo have finally been given names following a big response from the public.

The little Amur tiger cubs were born to mum Yenna just before Christmas.

However staff at the Colden Common zoo agreed to hold off from naming them so that visitors could get involved.

Almost 1,000 suggestions were received, from as far away as Japan, the USA and Iceland as well as from scores of local people, and from them the three names were chosen.

The female has been called Nika, meaning victory, with the males named Misha, which is a Russian pet name for Michael and also means 'he who is God-like' and Ilya, which means 'The Lord is God' and is also the name of the Amur Tiger Society's patron, Ilya Lagutenko.

A spokesman for the zoo said some of the names had been suggested by several people, so in the end a draw was conducted to find the winners.

They will now be invited to go along and meet the tiger keepers at the park, where they will also be introduced to the cub they named.

Fewer than 400 Amur tigers remain in the wild in eastern Russian, north eastern China and parts of North Korea, following widespread hunting and the loss of natural habitat. A further population of about 600 are also thought to exist in zoos around the world.

The spokesman added: "Marwell would like to thank everyone who responded to the invitation to suggest names, and we are extremely grateful for all the thought and research that went into finding names."