Modern Weights and Measurements of Wild Lions

[GuateGojira]

(02-25-2022, 06:54 PM). So SpinoRex Wrote: These arent interpretations really. Quoting this weight it should be always remembered that the lions were ADJUSTED for stomach content which puts them therefore at around 197 kg unadjusted (looking at the calculations and the protocol by bertram). Therefore i am not a fan of empty stomach weights especially in such datas as they tend to underestimate the weight automatically.

Quote:I checked the document of Keet and the sample of 16 doesn't say that is only males, but also includes females, so is 16 male and female lions from each population. Do you have the full document, or just the abstract? Also those weights are not adjusted for stomach contento, so normal weight is not even near the 200 kg, in fact, if we put those two samples together we get an average of 193.3 kg unadjusted, that means that the healty lions could be as low as 190 kg in the best case and the unhealthy even less. So, for the moment, the estimation of about 190 kg is the best case. The 18 lions from Roberts may include youngs (like Brander) but are also unadjusted for stomach content.

Its like the Southern Kruger Lions that around 16 lions were collared for both sexes. The Paper is a abstract but from SANPARKS itself (couldnt be more accurate). Under "normal" i dont consider the empty stomach weight but the unadjusted weight of an large sample as most arent adjusted. Suggested by Roberts and from Smuts the average male lion (including all sorts of individuals) average at 187.5 kg on an empty stomach and therefore as i said previously a "normal" weight of c.197 kg. The Data from Roberts is probably slightly above that including the study from Keet pointing also torwards that number with 200 kg. The data from Roberts defientely include some subadults (at least 1).

About the southern population im really strict although im someone who tends to include all sorts of lions up to a certain degree. You should think about it to include them by just looking at the infection they had (let alone the conditions, which are horrible because of tubercolosis).

Quote:https://www.jstor.org/stable/20095595

Abstract

Pulmonary tuberculosis caused by Mycobacterium bovis was diagnosed in an adult male African lion (Panthera leo) by culture of tracheobronchial lymph node at necropsy. The main clinical signs included weight loss and dyspnea. Clinical pathology showed an inflammatory hemogram, mild anemia, persistent hypercalcemia, and mild azotemia. Sera from the affected animal, conspecifics at risk, and nine clinically normal lions were analyzed retrospectively for antimycobacterial antibody using a protein A-linked immunosorbent assay. The affected lion and one clinically normal long-term cage mate had relatively high titers compared with those of two other animals at risk and nine clinically normal lions. These results indicate that serology was useful in identifying lions with active tuberculosis caused by M. bovis, and/or lions that have been exposed to M. bovis.

When i read Branders book about the Rhinos and some tigers he clearly mentioned that these were adult males and went a bit more in detail. Also the measurements are showing that there werent immature animals really (Or in a unsignificant degree)

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

Quote:Finaly, the sample of known males (Keet is still not know the real number of males) is of 81 and the average that I got "weighted" is of 191.8 kg (if I include the 6 males that you shared with me and the lion of 264 kg that is labeled as "Cape lion", the average is of 192.6 kg). Empty weights may be about 187 kg overall and prime males, based in Smuts, is about 196 kg. The maximum (from the Timbavati record) is not 253 kg, that is an exact number and we don't know how much that gorged lion actually ate, in this case the correct estimation for that lion is about 250 kg emtpy (lions can eat over 33 kg in one meal) and that is from a reserve that bread lions llike turist atractions (Timbavati is a private reserve), but is still usefull. I prefer to use the male of Roberts of 251 kg, we don't know its stomach content but at least it was not from a hunting reserve (as far we know). Actually, I use both records, I want to be clear on this.

The new weights are 220,225,205(empty),248(empty),163 kg. The Male lion Kwande was later said to be an estimate by the reserve management/HQ but instead the heaviest male weighed 248 kg on an empty stomach. In 2001 that weight wouldnt wonder me.... they were really really bulky (you saw the pics i guess). Also i included the weights from Pitmans book of 217 kg n=5 (189 kg - 251 kg, unadjusted) and the other 2 males of 179 kg(unadjusted) and 216.3 kg(empty stomach) from Kruger. I didnt inlcude the 264 kg lion. Instead of this lion i included the weight of ximpokos partner Mabande. Yes with pixel scaling i got 197 kg on an empty stomach for the best age group, which shows they are easily above 205 kg(unadjusted) by following smuts strict method. 

Though the weight of 253 kg came probably after the adjustement of c.30 kg. So also a more rounded number. The exact number of the total weight isnt revealed (280, 281 and 283) and thus the estimate for this lion would be more or less a minimum empty weight as he could have been well at the 260 kg mark. I used the number of 253 kg as its exact and wanted it to be over the weight of 251 kg (as ximpoko was obviously heavier than that unadjusted lions).

Timbavati is hosting normal wild lions with some of their lions preserved in special areas with fences (i.e white lions). Its connected to Kruger and basically a 100% wildlife area especially talking about these two males who were weighed at COLLARING and not after these **** hunters got their license to kill them. These two males were the forefathers of the current birmingham coalition btw, so you know their origin. So these lions have nothing to do with that kind of stuff. Mabande somehow managed to survive after both of his big partners were killed. He left timbavati years ago because of the pressure and isnt at his best condition rn.

Quote:On height:

You know how tall is a cat of 116 cm? I am telling you this because is very easy to take the values published with no criticism, but we need to use logic and a size like that is too exceptional to be correct. The height of 114 cm recorded from Pitman is at some point suspicios as he did not measured it, he just got the records elseware. However, the figure of 114 cm from Selous came from an exceptionally large male and is more reliable. Now, the photogrametry is still not 100% exact, there is a range of error and we need to be carefull even if they say that the error is low. I will like to go deeper in that document to clarify some doubts because I remember when Dr Brady Barr use it in the wild with several mammals, and the results were normally larger than the taken ones, as far I remember.

I know how tall a lion of 116 cm is but some managed to surpass 110cm evidently with 2 being 114 cm and. So that male would be just 2 cm taller and looking at the other graph the numbers are really realistic. How much the method differs... well it depends on the scientists or the method in the method. But i understand you of course. But regardless even then this in the worst case confirms the number of 114 cm. As these are percentages the general height doesnt matter really. Also i remember this tigress but the male was still a bit larger. But even then one may notice the thickness. 

Quote:On the length:
The longest lioness, by far, is the female reported by Stevenson-Hamilton with 193 cm between pegs. That figure is reliable and I have saw lionesses of huge sizes.

Now, about the lioness from India, we need to be more critic and not only swalow the figures because are impresive or serve to an agenda. Check all the measurements first, here is the same info from the original document in this table that I created:

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

If you see, it doesn't make sense that a lioness is bigger than all full grow male lions in this list. That figure is certainly a typo, an error in the document. How do you think that it will look a lioness of 209 cm in head-body even if is "over curves", with a weight of only 110 kg and a chest girth of 105 cm??? It will look like this:

*This image is copyright of its original author

That is why we need to be carefull with the measurements published. There is another report of a lioness with a head-body of 2197 mm reported by Smithers (1971), but that is also an error and that was probably the total length and the tail was of 825, THAT size make more sense.

Weights at these lengths can accur especially talking about asiatic lions in general. Note 209 cm over curves isnt noticably more than 193 cm between pegs. But some needs to ask jhala about it. Also it not comparable to the dimensions of the smither lioness. The one is legendary-impossible and the other one is possible.

Man, your fisrt statment is YOUR interpretation, you are not talking about "empty stomach", you are talking about averages of 200 kg for male lions, and THAT is what I corrected. nothing in the informatino of Smuts even suggest that. Your estimations are not based in anything that Smuts or any other expert suggested.

About this: "Its like the Southern Kruger Lions that around 16 lions were collared for both sexes. The Paper is a abstract but from SANPARKS itself (couldnt be more accurate). Under "normal" i dont consider the empty stomach weight but the unadjusted weight of an large sample as most arent adjusted. Suggested by Roberts and from Smuts the average male lion (including all sorts of individuals) average at 187.5 kg on an empty stomach and therefore as i said previously a "normal" weight of c.197 kg. The Data from Roberts is probably slightly above that including the study from Keet pointing also torwards that number with 200 kg. The data from Roberts defientely include some subadults (at least 1)."

So you don't have the original document. In this case, how can you be sure that are not 16 lions both male and female included? Check that the list that you presented here do not match with the information provided in the abstract, so something do not make sense here. Again, be a little more critic in the lion data (just like you are with tiger data) and see that something do not match between the table that you presented and the abstrat. By the way, it doesn't matter if the document came from SANPARKS or from NASA, the point is that there is no published document so how can be sure that the information is correct? We need the original paper (if this actually exist) or in that case we need to real data of the lions. Because if not, I think that we need to quote the average of the lions presented in the table and not those from the abstract (for Southern Kruger lions at least). Do you think that is fair?

And again, nothing in the information of Roberts or Keet or Smuts suggest an average over 200 kg, for the contrary, all suggest that the average is about 190 kg and not completelly empty. Of course that Roberts could include some subadults, I accept that, because they were hunted animals and he was not present there, so he needed to trust in whoever provided the figures.

Now, if you starting remouving the sick specimens with lions, I think that is fair to remouve also the sick/unhealty tigers that has been captured and that are not in healthy state, you think is fair too?

About Brander, I want to ask in what part did he provided the methods that he used to state which animals are adults and which no? Can you show it? Meanwhile check this:

*This image is copyright of its original author

So Brander itself says that the method to estimate the age of the tigers is subjective, specially in those years. Now check what Dr Jhala says, based in modern techniques:

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

And this is corroborated in the tigers captured in Nepal:

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

As you can see there is a substantial overlap in size and weight, so whatever the method Brander user, definitely was not 100% efective and is more than sure that subadults/immature specimens of the size of adults were included in his sample. So we can conclude that based in several captures and with scientific methods that adult male tigers weight between 200 - 260 kg with some cases as low as 180 kg "healty", but lower than that will be unhealthy/sick/strayed specimens. Sadly, ALL the specimens from Sundarbans are in that bad state, so for them we don't know how a healty specimen looks like.

Now let's go on this:

*This image is copyright of its original author

The males that you send me are 5: 237, 230, 222, 248 and 205. Pitman (1943) mentioned the two lions of 179.2 and 216.4 kg BUT the 5 lions that average 217 kg are already included in the records of Roberts, so you are using them twice. About the lion "Mabande", I did not found any information in the database, may you share the source here?

So nothing, again, suggest an average of up to 200 kg, but about 190 kg, half of them empty and half of them not. And we are using the same records. About the lion of 264 kg I included this last time because Cape lions are in fact South African ones, but you have a point in not including it, as Mazák (2013) quotes two sources for this weighed and none of them is primary one, and Gerad Wood also do not present a primary source, so I am not sure about the reliability of this old record.

About the lino of Timbavati, as far I know, it was 280 kg, but if you say that it was around 280 kg, that means that we don't even know the real weight, so how can we use it? Now I have serious doubts about that weight, specially because the article in the webpage was deleted, there is no references in anu document and again, we are just trusting in emails from Boldchamp. I will continue using the 250 kg figure, but is doubtfull now. Definitelly they said around 250 kg, not around 260 kg, again that is your perception and not a very exact one for some reason. Using one of the emails but ignoring the other ones is not fair or logic, don't you think?

So you can hunt lions in Timbavati? I edited my post because I though that no, but now that you confirmed that means that Timbavati is also a private hunting reserve that bread lions for hunting. Mmmm, that reduce its credibility. 

About the shoulder height, so you are agree with me on this, that wile we have confirmation of lions (and tigers) up to 114 cm in shoulder height reliable measured "between pegs", all estimations above that must be take with caution.

Finally, this part from you, about the Asian lioness is very dissapointing: "Weights at these lengths can accur especially talking about asiatic lions in general. Note 209 cm over curves isnt noticably more than 193 cm between pegs. But some needs to ask jhala about it. Also it not comparable to the dimensions of the smither lioness. The one is legendary-impossible and the other one is possible."

I was waiting from you a more reliable perspective about how morphology works, but I am dissapointed. If you think that Asian lions are like cheetahs, or if you are prepare to defend the indefendeble, then it doesn't make sence in discussing this point with you. I showed you the measurements of males and females, you SEE than that particular lioness is bigger than all the males based in those measurements and that is of the same size of the biggest Zimbabwe lion measured by scientists and you still think that the measurements of that particular lioness are real? Are you sure about what you are defending? Did you see that the shoulder height is only 81 cm (from shoulder to tip of paw, because is obvious that all the shoulder heights in the document are not the real standing heights) and the chest girth of only 105 cm? This is how your "reliable" Indian lioness will looks like:

*This image is copyright of its original author

Each scare is 10 cm, both lionesses are scaled at 75 cm in stainding height and the upper lioness has a head-body of 190 cm "straight line" and even then, it looks horrible and biologically IMPOSIBLE. The under one measure 150 cm straight and you see the difference.

Now you see the error? You see my point when I say to you that we must not swallow everithing without been critical? Please think about this again.

Please see that when I make my conclutions I am doing it based in facts stablished by experts, and because I don't want to be acused of biased I use all the small weights for the tigers, but if we exclude all those small males under 170 kg (just like you want to do with the exclution of the South African lions from the southern region), the average for male Bengal tigers is higher by a significative margin. Reply

[GuateGojira]

(02-25-2022, 07:40 PM)SpinoRex Wrote: Recent Information about the male lion from Richard Kock

On Discord i was honored with some emails about the stomach intake AND body condition of the male lion, as some suggested he would be really really bulky with a good reason.




In all of his mails he mentions the mail lion to have an empty stomach, which makes sense based on the story as well. Also he replied to the one question regarding his email where he mentioned "little stomach content". Credits @Epic

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author



Body Condition

Based on the fact he was so heavy obviously i was interested in his body conditioned and asked the user to ask R.Kock about the condition of the lion based on a study. These estimation was able to do thanks to a study with stages. LION (Panthera leo) CARE MANUAL

The estimate was done with these pictures:

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

Here is the answer by Dr. Richard Kock:

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

So this is not a communication between you and Mr Kock? Is from another person that we don't know and, again, that we don't have any form to confirm if this is real? Just asking.

Even then, how much weighed that "little material"? Because certainly did not weighed 1 pound only.

And like Pckts clearly mentioned, "6" would be high for a wild lion, and this was a notorious cattle killers that probably had more fat, after all, less work and easy prey provide more mass. Other thing, in any part of those communciations says that this lion wasn't really fat but massive in terms of muscle mass, you should remember that big males may have also subcutaneous fat, like the big male of 225 kg measured by Dr Smuts.

So, nothing new for me in this communications, just a massive lion thanks for a living in domestic cattle and if we follow your idea that nomadic male lions eat more, this lion probably gorged himself so much that obviously was a massive beast, an abnormal specimen, an outlier like Dr Yamaguchi said. Reply

[GuateGojira]

(02-25-2022, 10:44 PM)SpinoRex Wrote: Yeah but sadly "empty stomach" isnt normal in weight datas. The 42 adult males from C.India werent adjusted and weighed 190.5 kg. Just like the 44 males shot by C.Behaar and the males killed in terai. Thats the reason why you have to seperate it. The only datas that adjusted their specimens in large samples were Bertram and Smuts

About the crater males i said about. Though i dont know if any cat population can reach 220 kg if unsucessfull males are included (Even those in Pillibhit and Corbett are of 170-180 even though the corbett male was a large one). Maybe in some areas but not on an empty stomach thats for sure.

Again, Brander/Cooch Behar/Hewett did included several specimens under 180 kg and those were not fully grow adults, remember that 180 kg the mark for "healthy" but still small adult males and over 200 kg is from heathy adult males. If we remouve those small specimens the average is definitelly over 210 kg. In this case, animals from Cooch Behar do not include ANY gorged or full of beef specimens, I remouve them all, you know? And those from Brander, even when they may have been gorged, the inclution of the subadults helped to balance the values. On Hewett records, there is no description about that, but he mentions that weights are unreliable if the specimen is baited so we can especulate that some of they specimens were not gorged. In fact, if you check the hunt of the tiger of 259 kg you can see that they used a macan, and that can be placed only before to place the bait. Check this interesting image:

*This image is copyright of its original author

This suggest that not all "baited" tigers killed and ate the baits, specially if you used a macan. Or you, as a hunter, will wait until the tiger ate full to kill it, or you will shot him at the first oportunity? Logic, that all I ask in this matters. Reply

[GuateGojira]

(02-25-2022, 07:25 PM)SpinoRex Wrote: Also i would maybe accept the collection from guate excluding the smaller males which then perfectly fits in the average weight given by Dr Eric Dinerstein (around 460 pounds =208.8 kg) for nonadjusted males of terai

If you are referint to the next image, then you have a problem:

*This image is copyright of its original author

Dr Dinerstein is basing his statement in 3 adults males (200, 272+ and 272+ kg) and several SUBADULTS, so that is not an "average" from him. Remember that he weighed only one male tiger, the other two were from Dr Sunquist and Dr Smith and finally the other man-eater tigers (from which we only know one weight) all where weighed after he finished with tigers and he completelly focus in rhinos. Believe me, I know the entire history of all the Nepalese tiger study, specimens, experts and all what you want to know that is published. Reply

[Pckts]

(02-25-2022, 10:44 PM)SpinoRex Wrote:

(02-25-2022, 09:43 PM)LoveAnimals Wrote:

(02-25-2022, 07:25 PM)SpinoRex Wrote: Again you have to consider that these weights of 187.5 kg are based on a empty stomach as well as the "prime males of 197 kg", which is a big difference than just a normal weight.

What do you mean by this statement?
 What do you mean "normal weight"? 
Weights adjusted for stomach content must always be considered as the normal weights of an animal because that is the real weight or on an empty stomach precisely for the reason that the stomach weight is based 100% on the body mass of that animal without that external corpses such as food interfere or influence the whole.

Yeah but sadly "empty stomach" isnt normal in weight datas. The 42 adult males from C.India werent adjusted and weighed 190.5 kg. Just like the 44 males shot by C.Behaar and the males killed in terai. Thats the reason why you have to seperate it. The only datas that adjusted their specimens in large samples were Bertram and Smuts

About the crater males i said about. Though i dont know if any cat population can reach 220 kg if unsucessfull males are included (Even those in Pillibhit and Corbett are of 170-180 even though the corbett male was a large one). Maybe in some areas but not on an empty stomach thats for sure.

Empty stomach is normal since more than half the culled Lions had an empty stomach as said by Smuts.
Not to mention, the only stomach content actually measured was from the culled Lions not the others and stomach content outside the culled Lions was based off of an estimated bait body weight minus amount eaten. Not an exact science there, like Hoogestijin said, there's absolutely no way to know the amount of food inside a cat unless you cut it open.

So any additional weight added to the captured cats is baseless. The average is the average, simple as that.
No one makes an excuse when quoting Brander that he had a 160kg Male Tiger mentioned in his average as well as not having a scale on hand to weigh the (600lb *est* Tiger) 
So reduction or addition of either of those cats could probably make a difference in the average of the 42 cats. 
When sample sizes are low the averages are too skewed. 
It's pretty safe to say that no matter the population, Lions and Tigers are generally around 200kg with large males around 230kg and exceptional ones 270kg+
If you want to argue how often they reach the "large and exceptional" sizes you can but I'd wager it's the Tiger doing so more often since you're comparing Lions who have roughly 20-30 thousand individuals in the wild vs Tigers who have roughly 3-5 Thousand. Reply

[Pckts]

(02-22-2022, 11:37 PM)Khan85 Wrote:

(02-22-2022, 11:33 PM)Pckts Wrote:

(02-22-2022, 11:11 PM)Khan85 Wrote:

(02-22-2022, 01:42 AM)SpinoRex Wrote:

(02-21-2022, 08:23 PM)GuateGojira Wrote:

(02-20-2022, 11:04 PM)SpinoRex Wrote: I dont think thats the right argument tbh. But anyways as i said its about the same

It is not the same. Old bones lost condition with time, this is showed in all the cases of skulls that when dried and now they weight less with time. Some bones may even shrink or turn to dust if they were not correctly prepared (boiled) and sadly, that is a common factor.

So Khan85 is right, bones may weigh or measure less than they original mass with time, if not correctly prepared. This detail is important in comparison, together with the status of the animal, the age, sex, subspecies/population, origin (wild or captive), health status, and other things that I may forget now.

All i know is that the lion sexes were mixed and subspecies unknown (asiatic or african) and had a humerus length of c.312mm and the Bengal Tigers also (c.314 mm). The heaviest tiger humerus was still in the average range for lions. What i noticed that tigers had constantly heavier left sided bones although the right bones were longer.

Yes you are right. Those studies have most of the time not detailed infos but arent useless. Anyways the difference are basically no differences. I dont know how major those differences are....

The 4 lions were captive and the tigers were unknown, but most probably from deceased wild tigers since they were procured by Department of Wildlife Health and Management.

Do you have the study available?

Anatomical Features of some Forelimb Bones of Lions (March 2021)

Anatomical Study on Humerus of Tiger (March 2014)

Unfortunately there is very little to go off of since the Lions used are averaged and the Tigers are not. That being said, the noticeable difference's I see are in the Head, Proximal and distal measurements. It's interesting to note that in these very limited specimens the Tigers seem very Head, Distal and Proximal heavy. You'll notice that both, Lions and Tigers had similar total length but the actual shaft length is much shorter in the Tiger than the Lion. Everything else is very minimal differences, there is certainly nothing there to make assertions for one over the other. The sample size is almost insignificant, no determination of sub species or wild/captive in the Tigers nor sexes mentioned. But like people, Tigers and Lions can show significant differences amongst individuals, some being more thick or thin boned than others. Some being large or small skulled, etc. Reply

[Charger01]

(02-26-2022, 02:17 AM)Pckts Wrote:

(02-22-2022, 11:37 PM)Khan85 Wrote:

(02-22-2022, 11:33 PM)Pckts Wrote:

(02-22-2022, 11:11 PM)Khan85 Wrote:

(02-22-2022, 01:42 AM)SpinoRex Wrote:

(02-21-2022, 08:23 PM)GuateGojira Wrote:

(02-20-2022, 11:04 PM)SpinoRex Wrote: I dont think thats the right argument tbh. But anyways as i said its about the same

It is not the same. Old bones lost condition with time, this is showed in all the cases of skulls that when dried and now they weight less with time. Some bones may even shrink or turn to dust if they were not correctly prepared (boiled) and sadly, that is a common factor.

So Khan85 is right, bones may weigh or measure less than they original mass with time, if not correctly prepared. This detail is important in comparison, together with the status of the animal, the age, sex, subspecies/population, origin (wild or captive), health status, and other things that I may forget now.

All i know is that the lion sexes were mixed and subspecies unknown (asiatic or african) and had a humerus length of c.312mm and the Bengal Tigers also (c.314 mm). The heaviest tiger humerus was still in the average range for lions. What i noticed that tigers had constantly heavier left sided bones although the right bones were longer.

Yes you are right. Those studies have most of the time not detailed infos but arent useless. Anyways the difference are basically no differences. I dont know how major those differences are....

The 4 lions were captive and the tigers were unknown, but most probably from deceased wild tigers since they were procured by Department of Wildlife Health and Management.

Do you have the study available?

Anatomical Features of some Forelimb Bones of Lions (March 2021)

Anatomical Study on Humerus of Tiger (March 2014)

Unfortunately there is very little to go off of since the Lions used are averaged and the Tigers are not. That being said, the noticeable difference's I see are in the Head, Proximal and distal measurements. It's interesting to note that in these very limited specimens the Tigers seem very Head, Distal and Proximal heavy. You'll notice that both, Lions and Tigers had similar total length but the actual shaft length is much shorter in the Tiger than the Lion. Everything else is very minimal differences, there is certainly nothing there to make assertions for one over the other. The sample size is almost insignificant, no determination of sub species or wild/captive in the Tigers nor sexes mentioned. But like people, Tigers and Lions can show significant differences amongst individuals, some being more thick or thin boned than others. Some being large or small skulled, etc.

Proximal and distal ends are the location of muscle attachment, and since they are more heavily built in tigers it reflects why even Dr. Christiansen indicated that difference in muscle attachment (pfp) is sizeable

btw in case you didnt know, Dr. Christiansen has a large sample and he told that tigers had more robust bones (although difference was very slight) but in muscle attachments, the difference was very significant Reply

[AndresVida]

(02-26-2022, 12:32 AM)GuateGojira Wrote: This is how your "reliable" Indian lioness will looks like:

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

"Hey I've seen this one! It's a classic"

The long tables with short legs, like the Barbary lion unreliable measurements Reply

[Pckts]

(02-26-2022, 03:18 AM)Khan85 Wrote:

(02-26-2022, 02:17 AM)Pckts Wrote:

(02-22-2022, 11:37 PM)Khan85 Wrote:

(02-22-2022, 11:33 PM)Pckts Wrote:

(02-22-2022, 11:11 PM)Khan85 Wrote:

(02-22-2022, 01:42 AM)SpinoRex Wrote:

(02-21-2022, 08:23 PM)GuateGojira Wrote:

(02-20-2022, 11:04 PM)SpinoRex Wrote: I dont think thats the right argument tbh. But anyways as i said its about the same

It is not the same. Old bones lost condition with time, this is showed in all the cases of skulls that when dried and now they weight less with time. Some bones may even shrink or turn to dust if they were not correctly prepared (boiled) and sadly, that is a common factor.

So Khan85 is right, bones may weigh or measure less than they original mass with time, if not correctly prepared. This detail is important in comparison, together with the status of the animal, the age, sex, subspecies/population, origin (wild or captive), health status, and other things that I may forget now.

All i know is that the lion sexes were mixed and subspecies unknown (asiatic or african) and had a humerus length of c.312mm and the Bengal Tigers also (c.314 mm). The heaviest tiger humerus was still in the average range for lions. What i noticed that tigers had constantly heavier left sided bones although the right bones were longer.

Yes you are right. Those studies have most of the time not detailed infos but arent useless. Anyways the difference are basically no differences. I dont know how major those differences are....

The 4 lions were captive and the tigers were unknown, but most probably from deceased wild tigers since they were procured by Department of Wildlife Health and Management.

Do you have the study available?

Anatomical Features of some Forelimb Bones of Lions (March 2021)

Anatomical Study on Humerus of Tiger (March 2014)

Unfortunately there is very little to go off of since the Lions used are averaged and the Tigers are not. That being said, the noticeable difference's I see are in the Head, Proximal and distal measurements. It's interesting to note that in these very limited specimens the Tigers seem very Head, Distal and Proximal heavy. You'll notice that both, Lions and Tigers had similar total length but the actual shaft length is much shorter in the Tiger than the Lion. Everything else is very minimal differences, there is certainly nothing there to make assertions for one over the other. The sample size is almost insignificant, no determination of sub species or wild/captive in the Tigers nor sexes mentioned. But like people, Tigers and Lions can show significant differences amongst individuals, some being more thick or thin boned than others. Some being large or small skulled, etc.

Proximal and distal ends are the location of muscle attachment, and since they are more heavily built in tigers it reflects why even Dr. Christiansen indicated that difference in muscle attachment (pfp) is sizeable

btw in case you didnt know, Dr. Christiansen has a large sample and he told that tigers had more robust bones (although difference was very slight) but in muscle attachments, the difference was very significant

It's very interesting for sure, the tendons have more surface area to attach more muscle which also would allow them to withstand more force. The stronger the rotator cuff the more force it can withstand.
I'd still love to see a real sample size with sexes known as well as where they came from. I'd bet that depending on which part of the wild they came from you could see more pronounced differences. My guess would be anywhere they take larger prey the density and ends would be more exaggerated. Reply

[Pckts]

(02-25-2022, 09:47 PM)SpinoRex Wrote:

(02-25-2022, 08:29 PM)Pckts Wrote: 6 would be high for a wild lion, notorious cattle killers will generally show more fat though.
-Less work and easy prey

I think many thought it to be 7-8. At the end it was in the moderate range(in the upper moderate range), which means he wasnt really fat but massive in terms of muscle mass. This lion regardless of other lions was a robust one (his skull says enoughfor a E.Lion). This shows how rare such weights are.....

Who thought that?
A wild Lion will never look like 7-8, but in terms of a wild Lion looking like 6, that certainly would be a cat that carries more fat than your standard Wild Lion. But regardless, no one said he's not a big cat, just probably a little heavier than a Lion would be under normal circumstances. Reply

[SpinoRex]

The "interpretation" i got was sadly from Bertram (The protocol used by smuts and via pers com) and i used the calculation. Therefore i just said that the *note* should be taken intead of just quoting them(this goes torwards especially pcts). Also if you have a problem with your interpretation... it makes no sense that you claimed the 200 kg males to be 190 kg empty. And pcts its no wonder that big cats of that weight will carry more fat than a average but fact is that it was in the moderate stage (no matter which degree now). I think if many of you would just read carefully what i wrote.... half of the discussion would not exist.

@GuateGojira I said i understand you before. But your comparison is out of proportions and the same would look silly using the 193 cm lioness (the asiatic one would be 195-198cm between pegs. Even more so comapring it to a 220cm lioness over curves. My question to you would be when you are really strict in low weights then i am interested why you include the 132 kg and 138 kg males from both smither and wilson. And the one Botswana male from Wilson, which is measurement wise a clear cut subadult.

Also can you show me where its mentioned that these lions were the ones measured by Campbell or the ones published by Roberts? The lions height from roberts sample were measured over curves

About your claims from Brander your correlations makes no sense (obviously because of the measurements you didnt reply to such as length, height and girths from the data) and its a really heavy statement by you with no clear evidence. But honestly it wont make it better to speculate... when those of the bettter areas didnt average noticably more (just by 10-15 kg, unadjusted). Also the smallest male was of 167 kg which again confirms that your opinion isnt correct. The samples from Behaar came from the areas where tigers were known to be big and even so many tigers of smaller dimensional size wasnt included makes the point more clear that it was indeed based on adult males by that logic excluding the gorged ones (or evem better you could adjust them by 20-30 kg and include them as "empty stomach" males). Can you present those 9 gorged specimen? If you tend to ignore those measurements then you should contact those scientists like Jhala. 

@"Khan85" First of all the sample was on 4 individuals per study(because you combined it with the email) and once you look at it again it becomes clear that lions do have really the thicker bone than tigers(sample for both is very high), which may be the reason for the weight difference. But the muscle attachements will mainly depend on individuals . 

The studies where PC worked as the author or Co-Worker are showing the advanatage to the lion(Ml, AP, girth) combined with the other studies. Overall the ML Diameter for lion and tigers is of 8.59%(leo) and 8.64%(tigris) and the AP Diameter 11.9%(Leo), 10.7%(Tigris) with good sample sizes showing there is basically not a difference. Those in AP CC, ML CC were significant but the sample wasnt large Reply

[GuateGojira]

(02-26-2022, 07:37 PM)SpinoRex Wrote: The "interpretation" i got was sadly from Bertram (The protocol used by smuts and via pers com) and i used the calculation. Therefore i just said that the *note* should be taken intead of just quoting them(this goes torwards especially pcts). Also if you have a problem with your interpretation... it makes no sense that you claimed the 200 kg males to be 190 kg empty. And pcts its no wonder that big cats of that weight will carry more fat than a average but fact is that it was in the moderate stage (no matter which degree now). I think if many of you would just read carefully what i wrote.... half of the discussion would not exist.

@GuateGojira I said i understand you before. But your comparison is out of proportions and the same would look silly using the 193 cm lioness (the asiatic one would be 195-198cm between pegs. Even more so comapring it to a 220cm lioness over curves. My question to you would be when you are really strict in low weights then i am interested why you include the 132 kg and 138 kg males from both smither and wilson. And the one Botswana male from Wilson, which is measurement wise a clear cut subadult.




Also can you show me where its mentioned that these lions were the ones measured by Campbell or the ones published by Roberts? The lions height from roberts sample were measured over curves




About your claims from Brander your correlations makes no sense (obviously because of the measurements you didnt reply to such as length, height and girths from the data) and its a really heavy statement by you with no clear evidence. But honestly it wont make it better to speculate... when those of the bettter areas didnt average noticably more (just by 10-15 kg, unadjusted). Also the smallest male was of 167 kg which again confirms that your opinion isnt correct. The samples from Behaar came from the areas where tigers were known to be big and even so many tigers of smaller dimensional size wasnt included makes the point more clear that it was indeed based on adult males by that logic excluding the gorged ones (or evem better you could adjust them by 20-30 kg and include them as "empty stomach" males). Can you present those 9 gorged specimen? If you tend to ignore those measurements then you should contact those scientists like Jhala. 

I have the documents of Dr Bertram and I don't see any "interpretation" that is even close to what you are saying. So show the parts and the documents that you used for your claims and we will see. 

About the lioness comparison, THAT IS THE POINT! The measurements reported for that Indian lioness are completelly out of proportions and are not realistic. And now, the lioness of 193 cm it make sence, check this image:

*This image is copyright of its original author

Not my best draw and my best letter , but there you can see that the largest lioness of Stevenson-Hamilton make sense with a shoulder height a little over 85 cm (a similar sized lioness had a height of 84 cm and still looks realistic). These big lionesses had a morphology close to tigers, long and not so tall, but still make sence as you can see. But check the lioness from India, see that I correct it by 17 cm, a correction just for the biggest tigers according with the Maharaja of Cooch Behar, and even then the lioness looks horrible, imposible, unrealistic in every way! That is not a lioness, is more like a weasel. Plus, even if we assume that the shoulder height is a real standing height, is still incorrect. So, in any form that you want to see it, that lioness is not reported correctly. If we use a length of 195-198 cm as you propuse (for a lioness of less than 80 cm in "real" standing height and a weight of only 110 kg) we will get an even worst lioness and more like a weasel!

*This image is copyright of its original author

But even if after checking the two images you still insist in going agains any logic, I will understand.

About Brander, it is not a claim, is a FACT. Like I said, he even accepted it that is hard to state which are adults and which not. About your complain on girth, length and other data, we don't have it as Brander did not published that, just like Hewet. However, Hewet did provided details on 3 of the 4 small males that shows that were subadults or that were injured. About Cooch Behar, we have all the measurements but only a few have details, even then we can correlate with the information from Dr Jhala. Also, while the smallest male is of 167 kg in Brander's data, that doesn't mean that this was the only small male in the sample, remember that is a SAMPLE and we only know the extremes and the average, not the individual 42 males used, so your complain is futile here. 

On Cooch Behar, we included ALL specimens, no one was excluded, not even the small specimens that at any light are young ones and not fully grow and definitelly less than 3 years old. The only thing that I exluded were the weights are they were gorged so I will avoid to creat a bias in the samples, but no measurement or weight was excluded after that, so I don't understand your complain, or maybe you did not know that, or your "friends" from the other forum are missinforming you.


About this: "Can you present those 9 gorged specimen? If you tend to ignore those measurements then you should contact those scientists like Jhala."

I don't understand, what do you mean with this? Besides I presented you the information of Dr Jhala and the results from tigers studies in Nepal and you just ignored all that. So, again, what do you mean with this? Reply

[GuateGojira]

(02-27-2022, 09:12 PM)SpinoRex Wrote: The emails are from the user Ahmed. He forwarded me the email. If you want i can forward it to you.

He was replying to the one email from 2008. The infos regarding the male are enough regardless of the claims. He attacked a tourist camp, which means he was really starving for a time and therefore completely empty. The male of 225 kg was probably small and really bulky because Smuts showed in his book lions of 218 kg that looked completely normal

The body condition for this lion is therefire completely normal and healthy as indicated by Kock. Compare Ximpoko in his nomadic times( abit higher fat percentage.. comparable to kocks lion i guess) and when he was a pride male(leaner). He had a normal fat percentage for any wild lion of this weight (at similar dimensions). Moderate means normal and the lowe ones (170-80) will be moderate low, the modertae lions will be most likely (190-200 kg) and the ones that are moderate high (225 kg+ it at average dimensions)

I expected him to be obese before i saw his skeleton. His skeleton suggest he was able to put on a HUGE amount of muscle mass but of course fat. Naturally its impossible for a wild cat at normal dimensions to be 272 kg empty with normal bodycondition. This lion was an outlier most likely and definetely a exception. The lion ximpoko and the Kanha male were also said to be exceptionally large. BDM was said to be bigger by far than ximpoko (acc to Almero, his biggest male he ever saw or captured with a root girth of an adult human ankle)

TIMBAVATI

Though lions are free in timbavati they go in different NPs or Reserves. The 2 males were collared for scientific purposes so thats no the problem. 

I will quote what was written

Quote:The Leopard research project darted the two nomadic males to gather information on the cats and to check the collar of the younger male, to ensure that the collar is still fitted correctly and that it is not causing him any discomfit. The plan is to keep the collar on him until March next year so that they can gather as much information as possible (such as the size of their territory and the impact they have in that area).

On average male lions weigh between 210kg to 250kg, and females between 170kg to 190kg. One of the interesting facts gathered by the darting of the males, is that the bigger of the two is a whopping 280kg – a significant difference in what is considered average (please note that this male was weighed shortly after eating)!

We will keep you up to date as the dynamic between these two nomadic males and the Machaton pride develops.
Until next time,

Richard

 
The left lion is ximpoko and the right one Mabande

Good propaganda for the park, two exceptional males of 250 kg, one of them empthy. Big by any standard.


Smuts did not said anything about the lion of 225 kg, nor that was small or that was big, so your speculation is not necesary. Only thing that we know is that was fat altough empty.

About the lion of 272 kg, of course it was in good form, that animal was feeding in good beef for a lot of time. His bones were much better than your regular Serengeti lion and its mass reflected that. Still wild, but with good food, it shows what a magnificent outlier it was.

Now, about the emptyness, it not necesarily means that attacked by hungry, cattle killers that eventually became in man eaters attack with no reason, check some of the cases with the Tsavo lions. That was probably why decided to kill it, it was a the verge of been a man-eater and it was necesary to destroy it. 

The lion Ximpoco and teh Kanha tiger, I don't think that are outliers, but just the normal maximum that they species can get, and althought they weighed over 280 kg, that is thanks to they meals and they weighed about 250 kg emtpy, large but not exceptional. Reply

[GuateGojira]

(02-26-2022, 08:06 PM)SpinoRex Wrote: Mabande is the male lion who was collared together by the LPD and was weighed as well but the male was overshadowed by ximpoko. You can look up what was written.

The weight of the males was later on revealed by a guide of the timbavati as 250 kg. The fact that he was collared and weighed is clear from the infos.

EDIT

I forgot to show you the video. I included him because of the fact he was collared and weighed and not just from the information of the guide.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9oHWKZKI-Vo&t=450s

So the two lions weighed 250 kg, just that Ximpoko was empty? That is what you mean?

I don't see any relevant in the video and even if he says something that is no form to check if is true. Documents, papers or even emails are better in this cases. Reply

[GuateGojira]

(02-26-2022, 07:37 PM)SpinoRex Wrote: My question to you would be when you are really strict in low weights then i am interested why you include the 132 kg and 138 kg males from both smither and wilson. And the one Botswana male from Wilson, which is measurement wise a clear cut subadult.




Also can you show me where its mentioned that these lions were the ones measured by Campbell or the ones published by Roberts? The lions height from roberts sample were measured over curves

I don't need to be strict with anything (except with the huge record specimens and in the source of the records), I included all but is you that is playing with been "strict" with lions since the conversation about McFarlane, so that is why I mentioned all this because if I start removing all those young tigers in the samples the average will be much higher.

By the way, the lions of Smithers and Wilson (1979) are not captured by scientific porpuses, are hunting records provided by Mr P. Johnstone and came from Rosslyn Safaris in Matesi, so they are second hand sources and may have errors, not just the age of the specimens but also the stomach content and the measurement method.

We can't know if the lions of Botswana are subadults of not as we don't have studies about age in that area. Remember that are be variations between populations, so until someone can show an study on the age of lions in that area of Botswana, like those made in East Africa and South Africa, we can't affirm or deny anything on this two males. Also, those weights could be "emtpy" and the ranges presented by Smuts clearly include males as low as them. Try to found the original source (Smithers, 1971) and if you have back up for your claim, like I have done with all the evidence on young tigers in old samples, we can remouve them. Reply