The Tiger

Tiger scent marking a tree. Scent is a way tigers recognise each other. Tigers do recognise each other and they probably achieve this by identifying other tigers by: appearance and scent (odour) sounds Appearance Each tiger has unique markings including the marking on the face. Human can identify tigers by their coat markings but we are unsure if tigers can do it. It seems reasonably plausible that they can. Scent Tiger scent mark like all cats wild and domestic. The scent sprayed on objects is as good as a calling card stating the name and address (in human terms). It is clear that tigers recognise other tigers by the scent that they deposit on objects. Also, the scent will be on tigers as it emanates from scent producing glands at various locations on their body as is the case for domestic cats. Scent glands for the domestic cat: Sounds Well, neither the internet (as a source of information) nor my excellent reference book state that tigers can recognise the sounds of other tigers su...

The way of life of the tiger is built around hunting. And each tiger lives alone and they hunt alone. In the forests of Asia where nearly all tigers live (except the Siberian tiger in the Far East of Russia) the world's biggest and greatest hunter has no choice but to hunt alone because of the dense vegetation which is their habitat.  Tiger kills a deer. They hunt alone. Image in the public domain. Hunting in a group would not be successful. Apparently, very rarely, they might hunt in a group under certain favourable circumstances but this is essentially a solitary hunter. Their method of killing is to get near as possible to the prey animal using cover from their habitat and their camouflaged coat. They approach prey downwind from the prey animal. This means that their body odour is not carried towards the prey animal which might alert them. The tiger has to get as close as possible to the targeted prey animal because they cannot sprint for great distances. They have to approach t...

This is a cross-post. The world of tigers is misogynistic by human standards by which I mean it is the male dominating and demanding easy access to females to procreate. And one way they achieve this is by having a home range which is much bigger than that of females and which encompasses the home ranges of several females. This allows them easy access for procreation.  It is a symbol, as I see it, of male domination, a bit like a harem in human society. It is a bit surprising to me that harems still exist in the world in the 21st century in third-world countries or perhaps illegally where they are accepted.  In ancient times kings and potentates in Asia tended to have multiple wives simultaneously. Wikipedia tells us that a harem may house a man's wife or wives and other unmarried female relatives and unmarried female daughters. Within a home the women live in a separate area and the male owns the home. It looks very similar to tiger social organisation. The seclusion of wome...

The situations during which tigers roar indicate that it is mainly used for long-distance communication. And the sound of the roar, which is obviously very loud, also supports this viewpoint. Tiger roar. Image: MikeB Tiger roaring is heard in a variety of contexts including the following as per Mel and Fiona Sunquist in their book Wild Cats of the World ( buy the book if you are interested in the wild cats as it is the best ) after a tiger has killed a large animal as a prelude to mating during mating when a female beckons a young and when some tigresses advertise sexual receptivity ( I expand on this below ). A contributor to the Reddit.com discussion on this topic, Nick Nicholas (40 years studying big cats 😎) says that male tigers roar to attract females. He correctly states that the home range of male tigers encompasses those of several females, and males know when a female is in season from their scent, and they will roar to attract her. He also says that tigers roar to warn other...

There are records of males killing cubs, and some of these instances of infanticide occurred at kills. So for young cubs, the vicinity of a kill can be a dangerous place because of the likelihood of encountering other tigers there.  Tiger cubs are vulnerable to being killed at kill sites by adult male tigers. Photo: Pixabay. The words are quoted verbatim from the book Wild Cats of the World . I take the words to mean that at a kill site where there is competition to eat the carcass of an animal, male tigers will kill a much smaller tiger i.e. a cub, to ensure access to the food.  To the best of my knowledge, tigers do not kill cubs in order to bring the mother into heat so that they can procreate and generate their own offspring. Tigers don't do this or at least my research indicates this. But lions do. My research also indicates that sometimes in India's tiger reserves they use a buffalo, a live buffalo actually, as bait to draw tigers into an area so that tourists can wat...

Yes, tigers mark their territory like any other cat species including the domestic cat. One way they mark territory is to desposit scent from glands on their cheeks as you can see in the video. They reach up to a tree or a rock and rub their cheeks against the object.  This is Boris, a Siberian tiger released into the wild by Putin. Boris has hundreds of square miles in which to roam with very little if no competition due to the scarcity of Siberian tigers. Land tenure is part of the social system of the tiger. Both male and females communicate with a combination of scent marks, visual signals and vocalisations. Scent marks are probably the most important. "Marking fluid" is deposited. It is a musky liquid. It is often mixed with urine and sprayed backward onto upright objects. We see domestic cats doing the same thing. Scent may be deposited on faeces from the anal glands. The liquid secreted by these lands is similar to that in their urine. And, as you can see in...

Tigers, like all captive animals, can tend to pace back and forth as a way of coping with the stress of captivity. Due to stress, captive wild cats breed poorly, which is why it is hard to maintain population levels in zoos and also why zoos are bad because the cats are sometimes imported from the wild. The Born Free site says cats breed well in captivity. This is incorrect in my opinion. You'll see human prisoners in confinement in their cell for 23 hours in a day pacing in the same way. It is obviously therapeutic. I wonder if they copied it from captive animals in cages or whether it just happened naturally. Sometimes you'll see stand up comedians on stage walking back and forth. It seems to help delivery. Why does pacing ease stress? I am not sure. It probably distracts the mind as the mind has to work to a certain extent when pacing. Pacing may be a form of displacement behaviour much like nail biting in humans and nose licking in cats. It displaces anxiety and unce...

Counting tigers is notoriously difficult, in part because they are very secretive. They need to be to survive the activities of people. "Subjective judgments" have to be made. When you do that self serving interests can get in the way of making good judgments! The tiger count in India was overestimated at one time and it came as a shock when the figure was revised downward. It is almost possible to image the scenario whereby the tiger becomes extinct in the wild without people knowing about it. In the old days counting tigers was carried out by pug marks and scats. "Pug marks" are the footprint of an animal. The word "pug" means "foot" in Hindi. "Scats" are fecal droppings. Camera traps are also used. These are cameras mounted on trees, rocks and such objects which fire off when a tiger passes in front of it. The positioning of the camera has to be assessed accurately and with wisdom. Both camera traps and radio collars are relia...

It is interesting to view the tiger at an individual level rather than globally or as a species. You can learn something about the tiger as a species that way that you cannot learn when you see the bigger picture. Charles McDougal, an author of the book: Great Cats - Majestic Creatures of the Wild had this opportunity. He writes that he was able to "document highlights" in the life history of a tigress named Chuchchi. I would just like to recite those highlights here if I may, on the internet. Chuchchi was born sometime before 1972 and had her first cubs in June of 1975. She was known to have produced five litters and 16 offspring but others may have gone unrecorded. Eleven of the cubs survived to adulthood - to the age where they can disperse to find their own home range. As is usually with female tigers, three of the female offspring found home territory close to the natal range (mother's territory). One was able to establish a territory because the resident female...

This is a chart showing the Bengal tiger prey profile for the Nagarhole National Park (Nagarhole is sometimes spelled "Nagarole"). The data was first published in 1995. Tiger prey is also hunted, poached or lost in some other way and therefore the profile as at the date of this post may be somewhat different. The source of the information is Wild Cats Of The World table 64 (authors: Mel and Fiona Sunquist). The authors of this fine work obtained the information from "Prey selection by tiger, leopard and dhole in tropical forests" by Karanth KU and ME Sunquist. Nagarhole NP is in the southwest of India. See all the tiger reserves of India .

The tiger has extraordinary athleticism and courage. Here is a verbatim account from a tiger hunt that took place in and around the 1850s. In those days shooting at tigers was commonplace. It makes me admire the tiger hugely but detest the human in equal measure. "Lieutenant Rice relates an anecdote of an extraordinary leap made by a tigress. He happened to be near the city Bhampoora, and was preparing to examine a large ravine in the vicinity, when word was brought back that a tigress had been seen creeping out of a thick patch of cover that had already been beaten. The beast had cunningly remained hidden in spite of the noise made by the men; and, thinking the danger was over, was attempting to sneak off unobserved to some distant jungle, when she was espied by a man who had been stationed near the spot as a look-out. Lieutenant Rice and his companion took up their position on the slope of a hill, and sent the sent the beaters round the opposite side for the purpose of driving...

Bengal tigers like to spend the heat of the day in water to dissipate their body heat. Image in the public domain. The tiger is adaptable in terms of habitat and climate. The tiger is very athletic. It can climb well when needed and swim exceptionally well (by human standards) when required (2 miles in sea water - see Lion vs Tiger ). What they need is water and large prey (ungulates - hooved animals) to survive. The best prey base in Asia is where there is a mosaic of forest and grassland 7 . The environment that suites the tiger also suites the leopard and the wild dog (dholes).  Tiger Attacked and Killed by Dogs. Image: Public domain. A pack of wild dogs can kill a tiger 7 . But the tiger can dispatch a leopard at will. The leopard steers clear of the tiger, accordingly, despite sharing the habitat with it. Where there is a reasonable tiger population the leopard population is reduced. In Siberia it is outgunned by the bear. Sambar deer. Image: public domain. The scope...