ON THE EDGE OF EXTINCTION - A - THE TIGER (Panthera tigris)

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peter

Co-owner of Wildfact

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#926

04-08-2016, 02:38 AM

A UNIQUE HUNT IN NEPAL (by Gen. Kiran Shumshere J.B. Rana)

a - Introduction and summary

In the late fifties of the last century, the Riblet Tramway Company set up the Kathmandu-Hetauda Ropeway under US Aid. The project manager, Mr. James Stone, hired the estate of Gen. Kiran. Mr. James Stone and his family, including his son Bill, spent a few years in Nepal.

Gen. Kiran was employed by the Maharajah of Nepal. He was involved in the annual shoots and had taken care of things in the last years. In the 1958-1959 winter, the shooting camp was in the Rapti Doon (Rapti Valley), close to a feeder of the Rapti. The Maharajah had commisioned Gen. Kiran to catch a few baby rhinos and tigers for foreign countries. The aim was not to kill the mothers of the cubs.

On the last day of 1958, a kill was reported. That winter, several guests of the Maharajah had been given a permit to shoot a tiger. The Maharajah had also asked Gen. Kiran if he wanted to shoot a tiger. Gen. Kiran was not keen, unless he was allowed to use his pistol (a .45). The Maharajah agreed.

Gen. Kiran went to the kill, about 4 miles south of camp, and shot the 'ringed' tiger. He wrote a story about the hunt, because the big male had not been shot with a rifle, but with a pistol. Seen in this way, it was a unique hunt.

I assume Mr. James Stone got the story from Gen. Kiran. Many years later, his son Bill found the blog of the son of Gen. Kiran and sent him the story written by his father.

b - How the story got to AVA

I'm sure the story was posted on Yuku's Animal Versus Animal forum (AVA) some years ago, but I'm not sure if it was the first forum where it was posted. I also don't know who posted the story. It could have been the son of Gen. Kiran and it could have been a reader of his blog.

c - My interest in the story

Gen. Kiran shot the tiger with a pistol from an elephant. Two shots were needed to disable the tiger. After photographs had been made, the tiger was put out of its misery. Gen. Kiran must have been a good shot, as the second shot was fired from 40 yards. A trapped and angry tiger moves all the time and a (heavy) pistol is much more difficult to handle than a rifle. I wasn't surprised the tiger was killed with a pistol, as a .45 is a terrible weapon.

My interest is in a few remarks on page 2 and 7:

" ... I have been privileged to arrange His Majesty's shoot for several years and have done considerable shooting ... " (pp. 2)

" ... He was in a rage and went tearing past in front of me. I fired at about 40 yards and hit him at the right side of the body just a wee bit lower than the arm. He tumbled and fell, picked himself up and then crawled into the tall grass to my right and let out a painful roar ... " (pp. 7).

" ... One of the Mahouts leaned over and saw the tiger lying and asked us to come in and finish it. We went in cautiously expecting a charge, but the tiger was barely able to raise its head. He could hardly manage a grimace of greeting, much less a growl. His breath was coming in hiccoughs and he was dying. The light was poor for pictures but after Lal had taken some I put the animal out of its misery. Eagerly my son and nephew got down from their elephants to measure it and it turned out to be 10.3 round the curve of the body (from the tip of the upper lip to the tip of the tail ... " (pp. 7).

Based on these remarks, I concluded Gen. Kiran had been responsible for the arrangements (referring to the annual shoots) but not the measurements. If he would have been, he wouldn't have allowed others to measure the tiger. Gen. Kiran, to be sure, was not mentioned in the book of Smythies.

As to the way the tiger was measured. Those with experience know the length of a big cat should be measured from the tip of the nose to the tip of the last bone of the tail. A measurement taken from 'the tip of the upper lip' will increase the length by at least 2-3 inches. If he would have been measured correctly, the length would have been about 10.0 'over curves'. This means he was about average in length for a Nepal male tiger. Compared to the average I found for Chitawan males shot in the period 1933-1939, he was a bit shorter.

We know Hewett and Dunbar Brander thought the difference between the two most used methods ('over curves' and 'between pegs') in male tigers was 3 inches, whereas the difference was 5,45 inches in 10 Cooch Behar male tigers (see my previous posts on tigers in northern India and Nepal). I made a case for 3-4 inches in Nepal male tigers, but WaveRiders thought 6 would be closer to the mark. In this case, he could be right. The reason is the tiger wasn't measured by experts.


d - Nepal male tigers

Although there is a lot of information on the size of Nepal tigers, only total length was recorded. They were long, but very few were weighed and there are no measurements of skulls, necks, chests, upper arms and fore-arms at all. Anything to add?

Some years ago, I bought 'Hunting in the mountains and jungles of Nepal' (P. Byrne). It was published by Safari Press in 2012. As it's a limited edition, I can't disclose too much. I can tell you Peter Byrne was a professional hunter in Nepal, who closed down his hunting operation in 1970.

What did he have to say on Nepal tigers? In his opinion, many tigers in western Nepal were bulky animals with short tails and heavy skulls. There was a lot of individual variation, but this was the general rule.

e - The record Nepal leopard

In the my previous post, I wrote about a 210-pound male leopard shot in Nepal. Today, I checked the information and also saw a picture. I can tell you I don't believe one word of the story. For this reason, I edited my previous post.

f - Professional hunters, clients, measurements and reliability

I don't know about the experience of professional hunters (in Africa) today, but my guess is the main problem of professional hunters wasn't dangerous animals but dangerous clients. Many were bad shots and only wounded the animals they were after. When their targets returned the favour, problems often erupted. Not a few accidents were a direct result of bad shooting and panic. Worse was that some of the injured big cats turned to humans to survive.

Those able to shoot straight not seldom demanded, and often got, trophy animals. Over the years, I have seen many pictures of animals shot by clients of professional hunters. Most of these 'trophy animals' were (old) cats well below par in all respects. This, most probably, is the reason why angles were created and perfected over the years. Same for 11-inch tapes. Money always talks.

Today, big cats are bred on farms in South Africa. Not seldom, they are bigger than their wild relatives. This is what the 'market' wants and this is what is produced. Before they are 'released' to be 'hunted' by 'clients', not a few are drugged. I understand, but surely there are better ways to make a few bucks? Is this the way to preserve wildlife?

g - A unique hunt: the of Gen. Kiran