BOSTON – After a campaign with no debates, tweets, or televised attack ads, Americans voted this week in a presidential election with candidates including a condor, a gorilla and a panda.

Christopher the Lion had an early lead over Gigi the gorilla in the poll of visitors to the Franklin Park Zoo in south Boston, known as a PreZOOdential election, a zoo official said, leaking preliminary standings on condition of anonymity.

“I voted for Christopher, the lion” said Cookie, 9. She said that the lion impressed her and her friend. When they came up to the lion’s enclosure: “He roared. It was really exiting,” she said.

Some of the other animals in the six-animal poll – comprising a gorilla, a red panda, an ocelot, an anteater, an Andean condor as well as Christopher the lion — were doing less to get attention on Tuesday.

“I can’t see him,” one child said of Isidoro the ocelot – the cat was apparently asleep at the back of his cage. His campaign slogan, apparently anticipating his habit of sleeping during the day, says: “see if you can spot a winner.”

The voting began on President’s Day on Monday and runs until Saturday.

Maddie, aged 4, voted for Gigi, the western lowland gorilla, but she and her sister Lily were more impressed by animals not on the ballot.

“I liked the zebra,”she said. “I like black and white.” Lily smiled and said “crocodile” when asked which animal she favoured.

The incumbent president, Kiki, a female western lowland gorilla, has served two consecutive terms since 2006 and so is ineligible to run again and also has a baby to look after. Kiki sat by the glass wall of her enclosure, allowing children to come close to her baby.

“Of course they don’t know about the election,” said Gail O’Malley, overseeing the gorilla’s enclosure where this year’s candidate, Gigi, was sitting behind a tree trunk.
But she said that the election and posters help enliven the enclosures and made people go and learn more about animals they would not normally see, like condors or anteaters.

The solitary Andean condor, Tito, sat hunched on a branch on a tree in his outdoor enclosure, Jockamo the giant anteater, paced up and down his cage.
O’Malley also said that the election also drew more visitors to the zoo by adding an offbeat activity.

Several of the animals have been assigned campaign themes – Gigi the gorilla wants more “enrichment”, a term used for more objects to keep the animals from boredom. In the gorilla’s enclosure that means things such as balls, a puzzle for getting peanuts out of a plastic container with only small holes, new sounds and smells.

The red panda, called Stella Luna, is campaigning for early childhood education – she has two young. And the ocelot, whose natural habitat is a south American jungle but cage has just a couple of green plants, wants more conservation.

The winner, after votes are counted on Saturday, will get the honorary title of “president” and an inauguration party. That means perhaps a favourite treat will be handed over – lions like a chunk of meat, gorillas popcorn and peanuts, and anteaters a special insect dish.

O’Malley said that many children took the voting more seriously than adults did a real election. Young visitors often insisted, for instance, that they could not cast their vote until they’d been round to see all the candidates.

“In my family people simply go and vote for the guy with the Irish name,” she said.