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Tiger
The Sumatran tiger (Panthera tigris sumatrae)
The Sumatran tiger (Panthera tigris sumatrae)
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The Sumatran tiger (Panthera tigris sumatrae)
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The Malayan tapir seems to be a very understudied animal, quite strange and unfortunate because it's a fairly large sized herbivore.
 
Sultan male.
''Sultan, a male Sumatran tiger, caught on camera in Kerinci Seblat National Park. Credit: FFI/KSNP'' https://www.fauna-flora.org/news/covid-1...er-hotspot  *This image is copyright of its original author
  *This image is copyright of its original author Camera traps bring you closer to the secretive natural world and are an important conservation tool to study wildlife. Roads not only fragment tiger habitat, but they also escalate human-tiger conflicts and open access to illegal logging and poachers. Poaching poses a significant threat to their survival. Tigers are illegally traded for tiger farms, body parts and to supply the traditional medicinal use in Asia. Panthera’s Tigers Forever program operates in partnership with Fauna and Flora International (FFI) and local authorities in Kerinci Seblat National Park on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. Their goal in the region is to increase tiger numbers by addressing the primary threats facing tigers. Ultimately, they envision developing four to five well-connected core areas in the 14,000 km2 Kerinci National Park that serve as source populations for the larger landscape. https://news.mongabay.com/2020/07/what-m...east-asia/  (11-09-2018, 09:11 AM)GuateGojira Wrote: @phatio, do you have any reference for this weight? A webpage, document or email that I can use? sorry for the late reply @GuateGojira, i just saw your question today. the weight comes from veterinarian's ig post as you can see here:  *This image is copyright of its original author i also have two more measurements for you. 1 year old wild sumatran tiger named putra singgulung (boy from singgulung) weight 62kg, body lenght 95cm, including tail 170cm, height -, while his sister putri singgulung (girl from singgulung) weight 49,3 kg, body lenght 101cm, including tail 175cm, height 75cm. both comes from solok, west sumatra. here's putri  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author https://padang.tribunnews.com/2020/07/03...saudaranya once again, these figures comes from conflict/unhealthy tigers. 1 year old tigers without their mother clearly are problematic tigers. from the camera trap pictures we can see some big healthy "normal" wild tigers out there but we can only guess how much their weight since there are literally none of them, except maybe slamet, a healthy adult male weighing 150kg. we are all understand there are no reason for the govt/scientists to capture and takes measurements from these normal adult wild tigers, too much effort needed, too dangerous for both tigers and people involved. if india and rusia only have a few records, let alone sumatra, where prime adult tigers live deep inside thick jungle. anyway here are some camera trap pictures of healthy wild specimens. these tigers coming straight from the jungle.  *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  *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  *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  *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  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author and some big stuffed specimens  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author
btw, the dark orange furr of sumatran tigers is quite something to see. here are some of the darkest speciments i've ever seen.
 *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  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author the very dark facial stripe pattern combined with scary looking eyes often reminds me of villain character from anime/comic books. Sometimes looking stunningly beautiful, sometimes just scary. even when they are calm, they still posses that sinister look, as if they hate everything they saw around them   *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 one brave bird in front of him  *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  *This image is copyright of its original author eyes of the tigers (siberian and sumatran)  *This image is copyright of its original author the brightest and darkest tigers  *This image is copyright of its original author tiger named setan a vintage photo of male sumatran from netherland zoo, it's not a surprise if the zoo called him setan/satan (devil)  *This image is copyright of its original author when angry, they just go for it, no display of fear, just angry, that's it.  *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  *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 while the angry faces above coming from captive animals, their wild cousins shows different level of anger, imo. only small amount of warning but lot of sudden attack, that's the definition of anger for them.  *This image is copyright of its original author again, this last picture is special, it's not an angry captive tiger or captured wild tiger, this is the face of a free wild sumatran tiger trying to catch it's prey (a dog inside a cage) but failed to do so, in the middle of the jungle at night.  *This image is copyright of its original author can you feel it? the expression of dissapointed and anger of a wild tigers up close.   (08-16-2020, 07:48 PM)phatio Wrote: sorry for the late reply @GuateGojira, i just saw your question today. Thank you very much for the information and the confirmation. Thank to this, I was able to track the record and found that this male was captured in Seluma in the year 2015 and was trated by the Veterinary and tiger expert Erni Suyanti Musabine, I found many information about her, so the record is relaible. In this case, I manage to increse my sample on body mass of Sumatran tigers and the observation that all the records, except the male "Slamet", are from problematic animals is very important. I will provide more details in the topic of the "modern-weights-and-measurements-on-wild-tigers".
@GuateGojira maybe you should try to contact herself directly to find out another measurement she gathered from her experiences. i've tried before but so far no luck for me, maybe she just too busy in the field. she is one of the few who were 'lucky' enough to interact directly with the elusive and enigmatic wild sumatran tigers.
some of her interesting experiences that i can remember are: - at the beginning of her carier, she has to tranquilizing snared tigers directly with her hand, a very dangerous moment, she recall. - another time she has to rescued another tiger trapped in a snare, but before she manage to tranquilizing it, the tiger made it to unbind the trap. fortunately it's leg was still entangled by barbed wire so it walked around and stayed in the bushes. still it's a very risky situation. -once she and her team has to race against a group of poacher. after two day jungle trek to find the animal, luckily, her team arrived first. due to difficult terrain, they had to treated the tiger for 10 days in the jungle where the team constructed a cage from branches and wired they found scattered around the location. -she and her team once followed by a curious young tiger 'Aliman' from the forest up until the village they stayed. (read my previous post in this thread) -she often tells a story from Seluma where a pair of tiger attacked villagers because one of them had killed their cub. some of the villagers escaped but they have been unwilling to return again. the most interesting part to me is... how can those tigers able to 'tell a story' to each other. i mean, a pair of tiger, must be the cub's parent right? lets say the mother knew exactly what happened, but how could she told her mate, and then ask him to attack the specific location? this reminds me of another remarkable story (from Aceh 2013) where a group of wood gatherer accidentally killed a tiger's cub and then as a retaliation a group of tigers killed one of the them and leaves the other five struck on tree for five days. according to the witness from local news, they were surrounded by at least 6 to 7 sumatran tigers! again, the question is, how can a solitary animal spreading the news to one another, then decided to make "coalition" and forget about their territorial behavior for a while just for a retaliation. @peter, i think your idea to create thread about wild animals and human communication is really a great idea, for sure it's interesting for many. back to the measurement topic, i think the data for wild sumatran tigers is out there, we will find out sooner or later. what worriying me the most is their future existence. luckily in captivity we have breeding program both in indonesia and foreign countries. and so far it looks promising. here are one of my favorite pair from Dudley Zoo, Daseep and Joao (Photos credit to vision-it-photography). beautiful Daseep with her little mane  *This image is copyright of its original author Dasep, she's one photogenic cat  *This image is copyright of its original author Joao, staring at something  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author Joao, the Mufasa tiger  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author Joao guarding his mate  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author i hope the indonesian goverment trully understand how magnificent and precious these tigers are, the last of sonda tiger  *This image is copyright of its original author
ON THE VINDICTIVENESS OF TIGERS
Very interesting post and good questions, Phatio. As to the rumours on the alleged vindictiveness of wild tigers molested by humans. The books and reports I read suggest there's a bit more to it than many assume. In this post, a few words on what is known. a - Sumatra and India Most old books in which Sumatran tigers feature have some information on the way tigers and humans interacted a century ago. Back then, Sumatra was a very wild place. In spite of the numerous animals capable of inflicting serious damage, incidents indicative of a kind of warfare between wild animals and humans, apart from the occasional man-eater, were few and far between. Those who wrote about their experiences agreed dangerous animals were respected and left alone by their human neighbours. And the other way round. After Indonesia became independent, it was decided to populate Sumatra. Most of the immigrants (from Java) knew next to nothing about the natural world. They also had a different culture and not seldom faced poverty. In the period they cultivated Sumatra, conflicts with wild animals, and tigers in particular, were quite common. The reports I read suggest tigers in Sumatra responded in a different way than tigers in India. In some regions of India, there was a state of war for quite some time. According to some Forest Officers and hunters, the battle was quite even. So much so, they were unsure about the outcome. Although many succumbed, the war didn't seem to have a 'personal' character. If anything, it was about business. Tigers treated humans and their domestic animals as just another source of food. One could say they adapted to the new situation in a quite, ehh, practical way and be close. In Sumatra, the situation compared in that the immigrants and the locals (referring to tigers) competed for space and resources. Although some tigers, like their relatives in India, developed into specialists (referring to man-eaters), the war seemed to have a different character. I read many books, articles and letters about the struggle in India, but never saw anything suggesting tigers targeted a specific individual or a specific village. In Sumatra, they, to a degree, did. The war between humans and tigers in Sumatra seemed to have, and still has, a very local, if not 'personal', character. What I read suggests Sumatran tigers, although anyone involved in the transformation of Sumatra is considered a 'legal' target, selected those ignoring the old code or involved in crime in particular. Some of the reports published after, say, 1960, point towards what we would consider to be a conflict between neighbours. Not a few incidents seemed to have a selective, if not personal, character. The question, as you said, is how did tigers knew who was responsible. Another question is if Sumatran tigers, 'solitary' animals like all other wild tigers according to those who know, really are able to 'contact' other tigers in order to 'discuss and solve a problem' with their human neighbours. Is it true these 'coalitions' consist of independent adults or were family members involved? Could these 'coalitions' compare to battlegroup with a specific target? Is anything known about the results of what seems to be a kind of guerilla warfare? b - Russia There are many rumours about the vindictiveness of tigers molested by humans in Russia. Vaillant did a case study. He wrote an interesting book about a male tiger wounded and robbed by a hunter. The tiger was shot, but survived. When he had recovered, he decided to get even. Everything Vaillant knew pointed towards a deliberate decision. According to those who knew him, the psychological warfare had an effect on the hunter in that he felt demoralized, if not doomed, before he was killed and eaten. Although not a biologist or an authority on wild Amur tigers, Vaillant knows about the natural world. Before writing the book, he did a lot of research. He knew everything one would want to know about the incident described in his book. It's one of the first books in which the interaction between a human and a wild animal is described in detail. It's also one of the first books based on facts and interviews with those in the know. Although some biologists seem to have some doubts about the conclusions on what seems to be 'vindictiveness', others have a different opinion. It doesn't seem superfluous to underline there is quite a difference between darting a tiger in order to collect information and robbing and wounding a tiger. My guess is tigers know. They seem quite capable in the department of reasoning and also know how to communicate. More than once, they informed biologists about the disadvantages of Aldrich foot snares. My guess is the message was received. I don't know if Aldrich foot snares are still used, but I do know the number of tigers captured in that way has decreased. Anyhow. Miquelle isn't the only one who concluded Vaillant produced something of interest. c - Conclusions Based on the book of Vaillant and the reports from Sumatra, one could conclude the rumours on the alleged vindictiveness of wild tigers pushed out of their home or molested by humans do not seem to be entirely unfounded. There seems to be a difference between Sumatra and Russia in that Russian tigers operate on their own, whereas Sumatran tiger sometimes seem to prefer cooperation. In both regions, tigers appear to select those involved in crimes. Crimes against tiger societies, that is. Their relatives in India, on the other hand, seem to have a more, ehh, general approach towards humans. My guess is the time for a debate has arrived. |
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