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Mama Joy, Zurich - "A mother's love for her child is like nothing else in the world. It knows no law, no pity, it dares all things and crushes down remorselessly all that stands in its path." - Agatha Christie

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Sea lions, Munich - "God could not be everywhere, and therefore he made mothers." - Rudyard Kipling

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Mama Elli and two-day-old Inge, Berlin - "Mothers can forgive anything! Tell me all, and be sure that I will never let you go, though the whole world should turn from you." - Louisa May Alcott

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Mama Yang Yang and cub Fu Hu, Vienna - "I remember my mother’s prayers and they have always followed me. They have clung to me all my life." - Abraham Lincoln

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Mama Hua Zui Ba and baby Chulina, Madrid - "A mother’s arms are made of tenderness and children sleep soundly in them." - Victor Hugo

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Ring-tailed lemurs, Hamburg - "A mother’s arms are more comforting than anyone else’s." - Princess Diana

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Mama and baby fox - "Whatever else is unsure in this stinking dunghill of a world a mother’s love is not." - James Joyce

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Mama Anne and baby Keno, Jakarta - "As my mom always said, 'You'd rather have smile lines than frown lines.'" - Cindy Crawford

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Mama macaque and baby, Sofia - "To describe my mother would be to write about a hurricane in its perfect power. Or the climbing, falling colors of a rainbow." - Maya Angelou

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Mama Delphi and baby Debbie, Duisburg - "My mother is my root, my foundation. She planted the seed that I base my life on, and that is the belief that the ability to achieve starts in your mind." - Michael Jordan

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Mama and baby elephant, Sri Lanka - "My mother is a walking miracle." - Leonardo DiCaprio

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Mama Flocke and her four-month-old, Antibes - "Love as powerful as your mother’s for you leaves its own mark… to have been loved so deeply... will give us some protection forever." - J.K. Rowling

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Mama kangaroo and her joey, Australia - "I unapologetically and unabashedly am deeply biased toward my mother." - Chelsea Clinton

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Mama chital and baby, India - "[Motherhood is] the biggest gamble in the world. It is the glorious life force. It’s huge and scary—it’s an act of infinite optimism." - Gilda Radner

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Mama sheep and her lamb, Poland - "When you are a mother, you are never really alone in your thoughts. A mother always has to think twice, once for herself and once for her child." - Sophia Loren

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Mama bear and cub - "Motherhood has a very humanizing effect. Everything gets reduced to essentials." - Meryl Streep

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Mama lioness and cub - "Because I feel that, in the Heavens above
The angels, whispering to one another, 
Can find, among their burning terms of love
None so devotional as that of 'Mother.'" - Edgar Allen Poe

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Horsey, Saskatchewan - "Having children just puts the whole world into perspective. Everything else just disappears." - Kate Winslet

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Mama and baby cheetah, Maasai Mara National Reserve - "[My mother] always said I was beautiful and I finally believed her at some point." - Lupita Nyong’o

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Mama lemur and her baby, Madagascar - "Mothers possess a power beyond that of a king on his throne." - Mabel Hale

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Mama and kitten - "Men are what their mothers made them." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

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Mama and her puppy - "The heart of a mother is a deep abyss at the bottom of which you will always find forgiveness." - Honoré de Balzac

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Kittens - And to everyone out there who didn't have to give birth to become mothers: "Biology is the least of what makes someone a mother." - Oprah Winfrey

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Mamma Theodora and daughter Java, France -

"Personally, becoming a mother has been such a rewarding and wonderful experience." - Kate Middleton

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Momma and newborn ring-tailed lemur, Italy -

"My favorite thing about being a mom is just what a better person it makes you on a daily basis." - Drew Barrymore

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Walrus Polosa and her calf, Germany -

"Motherhood is the most completely humbling experience I've ever had. It puts you in your place, because it really forces you to address the issues that you claim to believe in — and if you can't stand up to those principles when you're raising a child, forget it." - Diane Keaton

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Mama carries albino red-necked wallaby joey, Czech Republic -

"Having kids—the responsibility of rearing good, kind, ethical, responsible human beings—is the biggest job anyone can embark on." - Maria Shriver

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Walrus Dyna swims with her calf, Germany -

"Mothers and their children are in a category all their own. There’s no bond so strong in the entire world. No love so instantaneous and forgiving." - Gail Tsukiyama

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Walrus Dyna and her calf, Germany -

"Of all the rights of women, the greatest is to be a mother." - Lin Yutang

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Mama Sulli plays with her baby, Spain -

"I realized when you look at your mother, you are looking at the purest love you will ever know." - Mitch Albom

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Polar bear mama Valeska and her cub, Germany -

"Birth is the sudden opening of a window, through which you look out upon a stupendous prospect. For what has happened? A miracle. You have exchanged nothing for the possibility of everything." - William Macneile Dixon

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Monkey lovin, Guangzhou - "Motherhood: all love begins and ends there." - Robert Downing

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Otter pup and its mother, USA -

"There is such a special sweetness in being able to participate in creation." - Pamela S. Nadav

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Baby hippo swims with its mother, Maruska, in Czech Republic -

"Mother’s love is peace. It need not be acquired, it need not be deserved." - Eric Fromm

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Baby Debbie swims next to momma Delphi, Germany -

"It may be possible to gild pure gold, but who can make his mother more beautiful?" - Mahatma Gandhi

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Mother Keren Peles and her newborn, Israel -

"The love of a mother is the veil of a softer light between the heart and the heavenly Father." - Samuel Taylor Coleridge

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Manatee calf and its mom, USA -

"All those cliches, those things you hear about having a baby and motherhood - all of them are true. And all of them are the most beautiful things you will ever experience." - Penélope Cruz

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Baby elephant and its mother, Nepal -

"Motherhood was the great equaliser for me; I started to identify with everybody." - Annie Lennox

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A lioness plays with her cub, Bosnia and Herzegovina -

"That strong mother doesn’t tell her cub, Son, stay weak so the wolves can get you. She says, Toughen up, this is reality we are living in." - Lauryn Hill

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Tiger Iris and her cub, Russia -

"Motherhood is filled with magical little moments that bring you immense joy." - Namrata Shirodkar

See also: The incredible ways animals impact the Earth

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