The Tiger

Here is a picture on social media of a Bengal tiger about to be released 'into the jungle'. It seems that he was held in captivity for a period of time and was suddenly presented with the real world where he will have to fend for himself. Shock horror! 😎. It has become a 'funny cat picture' and entertained internet users, but there is a serious side to it which deserves discussion. Tiger about to be released looks shocked. Misleading image? I have a sneaking suspicion that people are being misled by the image because they have humanized the tiger. And images can mislead as they capture a fleeting moment. If there is a video, you'd have a different point of view I suspect. The human interpretation is that he is aghast at the prospect of joining the real world. His mouth hangs open and his eyes are wide and startled. It looks like he is saying to himself, "Do I really have to go out there and start killing animals for a living?!" Well, yes you do 😊✔️. But ...

This is one of those extraordinary pictures of a huge predator, a tigress, not killing and eating a prey animal that is right next to her. But rather than kill and eat this fawn the tigress appears to be relating to the young animal as one of her offspring.  Tigress carries a fawn in her mouth as if she is carrying her own cub. Photo: Instagram. Perhaps she is pregnant (see looks it) and those mothering emotions are coming out and dominating the emotion to attack, kill and eat. And sometimes tigers are curious so they don't always (albeit very rarely) kill and eat prey animals.  We have seen it before in fact with large predators, particularly big cats. I've seen a leopard playing with a young antelope, for example.  I guess sometimes these encounters start like this but lead to the death of the prey animal because the instincts of the tiger are somewhat jumbled up and at the end of the day the dominant instinct is to kill.  Notwithstanding that I am reassured tha...