The Tiger

It may surprise people to know that one of the world's great white hunters turned tiger conservation specialist, Jim Corbett, after which a tiger reserve has been named, said that, "Tigers, except when wounded or when man-eaters, are on the whole very good-tempered. Occasionally a tiger will object to too close an approach to its cubs or to a kill that it is guarding. The objection invariably takes the form of growling, and if this does not prove effective it is followed by short rushes accompanied by terrifying roars. If these warnings are disregarded, the blame for any injury inflicted rests with the intruder." Image in the public domain. The healthy tiger is a reluctant attacker of people. It wants to avoid people. They have the ability to kill people quite easily but the surprise to many is that they rarely do so. Radio collared tigers had been found about 10 m from a trail were hundreds of people walk. They have been seen next to a river in which tourist boats pass w...

The answer is yes , when possible. I have two sources for that. The first one is probably the best. It comes from my book Wild Cats of the World by Mel and Fiona Sunquist, perhaps the best book on wild cat species you can buy. In their section on "conflict with humans" they state that: "The most significant reduction in human deaths followed the 1987 introduction of inexpensive rubberised masks, which are worn on the back of the head. The authorities reasoned that as tigers normally attack prey from behind, rather than face to face, a mask worn on the back of the head should be a deterrent". Human wearing a face mask on the back of the head for protection against a tiger attack. The photo is by Raghu Rai of Magnum . They conducted an experiment to prove that this was correct. About 2,500 masks were issued to approximately 8,000 workers entering a tiger reserve. The authorities said that "The results were dramatic". In 1987 nobody wearing the masks were ki...

This is a tiger attacking a person on top of an elephant in the wild. Extraordinary. Image: Screenshot from a video. Tigers are large, powerful predators that naturally prey on a variety of animals. Although attacks on humans are relatively rare, they do occur from time to time. There are several reasons why a tiger may attack a human, including: Hunger: If a tiger is hungry and cannot find prey in its natural habitat, it may see a human as an easy target. Territory: Tigers are territorial animals, and if a human enters their territory, they may feel threatened and attack to protect their territory. Provocation: If a tiger feels threatened or provoked by a human, it may attack in self-defense. Injuries or illness: In some cases, a tiger may attack a human if it is injured or ill and unable to hunt its natural prey. It's important to note that most tiger attacks on humans occur when people enter tiger habitats or get too close to the animals. In general, tigers will avoid humans if ...

The video on this page shows a Bengal tiger in India (I believe) sauntering down a road and behind him/her is one of their classic prey animals, a deer, a mere 50 yards away. The tiger is entirely disinterested, probably sated on a meal not long before but it is a slightly incongruous video because we are used to seeing tigers attacking prey animals at anytime and anywhere within their habitat. This is not the case. Interestingly, when you read about the iconic tiger, you don't really anywhere about tigers shunning their dinner; shunning the chance to attack a prey animal such as we see in the video. We think they simply don't do it and attack anything that comes before them on their travels. This apparently is incorrect. Bengal tiger ignores prime prey behind it no more than 50 metres away. Screenshot. But if a tiger is going to be satisfied with eating almost anything they can catch as my reference book states, it implies that they will attack almost any prey animal but once ...

This is a video taken from what appears to be a bus or some other tourist vehicle in India. A bull is trotting down the road in a rainstorm towards the vehicle. The tiger is about 20 yards off the road to the left.  The tiger sees the bull and goes in to attack it. The bull in showing courage confronts the tiger at speed. The tiger backs off and the bull carries on its way.  This looks unusual because we are told countless times that tigers can pull down a cow fairly easily but there is something a bit different about this bull! It is wearing a mask. And the mask is white.  Image: MikeB Perhaps it was used in some sort of ceremony and I wonder whether the tiger became concerned because they could not recognise what would be for them a typical prey animal. Perhaps the tiger decided that he had not seen this kind of prey animal before and then decided that it might be dangerous and so backed off. That is my assessment of why this happened. The video quality is poor but the ...

My understanding of the attempts at Bengal tiger conservation, in at least parts of India, is that the local government pays compensation to the relatives or next of kin of a person who has been killed by a tiger. I will speculate that the purpose is to prevent retaliation attacks by the local people on the tiger. It appears that in some districts the local villagers have become tired of conservation efforts and want rid of the tigers.  Tiger attack at Chinese zoo. This is unconnected with the stories and the picture is here to solely illustrate the page. Tiger attacks in the wild are rarely if ever photographed. There are more tiger-human conflicts as the years go by because there are more people squeezing the amount of territory available for tiger reserves or they occupy land bordering tiger reserves or actually inside the reserves. All of which provokes confrontation. Example 1 A tiger mauled to death a 15 year old girl, Shivpyari Vishwakarma, who was collecting flowers in t...

Tigers use their black-striped orange coat as camouflage. Some people might find it hard to imagine the tiger coat as an effective camouflage but bearing in mind the wide range of landscapes in which they hunt it works well . A tiger approaches its prey stealthily and up wind using available cover. It will make a last minute dash to deliver a blow with its massive foreleg. The tiger's dash will be short at about 30 m in order to improve the chance of success as it will struggle to maintain top speed over distances much longer than this. Tiger attack taken from a YouTube video Large animals It knocks the prey down and then grabs the animal with the sharp claws of its four paws. At the same time it clamps its jaws around the prey animal's throat to suffocate it. Sometimes tigers keep its jaws clamped around the throat for longer than necessary and past the moment that the animal has died. It will then drag the carcass to a safe place to eat it. Tigers have enormous strength an...