Tiger Predation - Printable Version

When one thinks of the tigers hunting, one thinks of them hunting deer, wild boar, peafowl, buffalo, gaurs, and even bears. But if you were to tell someone that tigers kill fully grown rhinos, odds are, they will not believe you, and you won't have any credibility with them at all. However, I do have a rule when it comes to cats. NEVER underestimate the abilities of a feline. For example, one would think that a Eurasian Lynx stands no chance against a wolf, but scientists have confirmed that adult lynxes can and do hold their own against wolves one on one. So one shouldn't underestimate a feline. However, for those who don't believe in the accounts of tigers killing rhinos, we cannot blame them because lets face it, the idea of a tiger mauling a fully grown rhino alone sounds far fetched, and waiting for video evidence is a very reasonable thing to do. Me though, I do believe these accounts because the eyewitnesses are very reliable, and have no reason to make this stuff up. Also, a tiger can take down an animal up to 5 times it's own weight, and the tigers in the places where the accounts take place, the tigers can be huge, with the tigers from Kaziranga being some of the biggest wild tigers. But how do they manage to accomplish such a feat?

Here's one way they could do it. I had a private conversation with @parvez on this subject, and he has spoken to onfield researchers on this topic. Apparently, tigers will leap onto the backs of large prey like that, bite the back of the neck, break the neck or the cervical vertabrae, and when that occurs, the tiger can kill the animal in less than 5 minutes. This is amazing, the skin of the Indian Rhinoceros (Rhinoceros unicornis) is up to 3 inches thick. So to be able to pierce through that skin, and to break the neck, means that these tigers must have incredible bite forces.

Another possible way they can pull this off, is to use those strong jaws and claws to inflict some serious damage to the rhino, @Pckts has posted some photos of some rhinos with injuries that show what a tiger can do to a rhino with one slap on this thread. So I can picture a tiger making serious wounds on the rhino, failing to bring it down, but it knows the rhino is badly injured, so it follows the rhino for quite some time, waits for it to become weak from loss of blood, and eventually, it collapses, and the tiger either waits for it to die, or it finishes it off, but either way, it has a big meal.

For this feat, I can only see the biggest male tigers doing this, as rhinos are huge animals, and I just don't see a tigress on her own accomplishing this feat. However, tigers have been reported to hunt in groups, so I can also see a huge male tiger along with his girlfriend and adoloescent cubs hunting a sick, old, or injured rhino.