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Can a male Tiger have a successful face to face kill on a Adult Bull Gaur?
Can a male Tiger have a successful face to face kill on a Adult Bull Gaur?
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Can a male Tiger have a successful face to face kill on a Adult Bull Gaur?
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@Pckts : agree with you. The rhino is probably the hardest because the most armored prey for any tigers or lions. But I would dare to say, to pretend, that, contrary to african rhinos (black and white), I have never seen indian rhinos or even asian rhinos with a big horn (more than 20 centimeters). OK they are very armored beasts, but their horns are (in my opinion) not a very efficient weapon against a so swift opponent like a tiger . Apart from their horned stumb what does it stay ? Their mass, what else ? Teeth ?
Disabuse me... 
I have read that the great Indian rhino does not kill with it's horn, but kills with it's lower "tusks" which I have never seen. Even with neither horns nor tusks, a rhinoceros would be a dangerous foe. I also remember a post over at the now dead site AVA about an Indian rhino that had killed an elephant. I cannot remember any details.
I'd be interested to read about a Rhino killing an elephant.
I know in africa the young male elephants were killing rhino so they needed to bring in mature bull elephant to put the youngsters in their place and it worked. In regards to Rhino defense against Big cats, I don't think the horn will really come into play unless a cat makes a big mastake. But what will come in to play is their speed and mass, a kick or stomp or like Bro bear mentioned, a bite can be deadly. Indian rhino have very large tusks and are about the same size as black rhino I believe, I think whites are the largest. But indian seem to have even more "armor" on their body but that is just based off looks and not data obviously. 
Pckts, I guess Indian Rhino and White Rhino are of nearly equal size but on an average White rhino are ahead by some margin. Black rhinos are small compared to Indian Rhino
Check this page: http://animalsversesanimals.yuku.com/top...tionStatus
There I shared the data on the size of these giant rhinos. Take a read and share your conclutions on the size issue.  (03-25-2015, 11:52 PM)faess Wrote: Really doesn't have to be footage of the attack, maybe a book describing the details of a Tiger taking out an adult gaur face to face would be enough. When a solitary big cat whether a lion or a tiger attacks an adult large bovid gaur-water Buffalo- banteng- Cape Buffalo a frontal attack makes the cat vulnerable to the bovid formidable horns with which the cat could get severely injured or even killed, a pride of lions can use team to work to immobilize the Buffalo by biting the spine above the tail, weaken it by biting the spine and flanks , and eventually applying the killing bite on the wind pipe or muzzle. Solitary attacks by lions and tigers on adult healthy bovids involve hamstringing the victim or biting its spine immobilizing it and mostly starting eating it alive from the rump. When the cat sees a possibility of a frontal attack in case of a weakened, sick, pregnant, old, or young bovid it may attempt a throat or muzzle bite but more often than not attacking the rear and stirring away from the lethal horns is the way  (10-22-2015, 10:31 AM)Dr Panthera Wrote:(03-25-2015, 11:52 PM)faess Wrote: Really doesn't have to be footage of the attack, maybe a book describing the details of a Tiger taking out an adult gaur face to face would be enough. While I agree that this is probably the case most often, I don't think its always the case. I have seen madi-ta take a bull buffalo from the front, unsuccessfully but still attempted, I have seen males take down cows from the front and females do the same as well. I know the Odin (old bull guar) was seen with terrible wounds on his hump which is from a tiger jumping on its back and "riding him like a horse" But I have seen the large male tiger "Buffalo Killer" who made his living killing buffalo by breaking their necks. Breaking their necks so hard in fact "that their horns were driven into the dirt" I don't think hunting is cut and dry, like a fight, you must take the opportunity that is given to you. When a area of weakness presents itself, you must go for it. While the "safer" option is to avoid the horns, that seems to benefit a pride where they can take their time to make the kill, but a solitary attack seems to benefit much more from a quick kill rather than a drawn out fight. But I have also heard of battles with elephants and tigers or Odin the bull Guar taking all night long, so it will depend on "the size of the dog and the fight in the dog" so to speak. (10-22-2015, 09:49 PM)Pckts Wrote:(10-22-2015, 10:31 AM)Dr Panthera Wrote:(03-25-2015, 11:52 PM)faess Wrote: Really doesn't have to be footage of the attack, maybe a book describing the details of a Tiger taking out an adult gaur face to face would be enough. Absolutely, no two hunts are the same but the general rule is maximize opportunity and minimize risk of injury especially for a solitary hunter...injury may equal starvation and death so the greatest majority of attacks on large bovids are from the rear, having said that big cats always amaze me with individual behaviour , a tiger that sees more potential of a frontal attack and a level of risk it could take it will go for it. Specialists on tackling a particular prey or particular technique are described. In the end tigers are cryptic, solitary, nocturnal, elusive, secretive, and quite animals recording their predatory behaviour is a daunting undertaking. Tigers evolved as predators of cervids and suids and their distribution mirrors these prey ( Sidensticker), it is quite interesting that gaur, water buffalo, and banteng contributed less than 10% of tiger diet in all published studies except in Bandipur and Nagarhole where gaur and sambar contribute most of the eaten biomass ( possibly in other areas in south India I still need to see the results of studies).
If you have time to take a look through all the pages of the Tiger predation thread, I highly suggest it.
I really think you'll be amazed at how often tigers of both sexes and all ages prey on Guar. It amazed me, since I have read the studies for years about the rarity of predation on these big bovines. But I truly think that the invention of the digital camera, protection offered to these jungles and cats have allowed us to truly see the prey they choose. Any place where Guar live they are preyed upon and while I don't have any #s to back this claim, only visual evidence, I truly believe guar contributes a large portion of their diet. I feel like every week I see a different tiger feeding on a guar kill its made. 
If I were to say that Gaurs make up zero percent of the tigers diet in Ranthambhore, I would be technically right. But that is simply because there are no Gaurs in Ranthambhore. In fact, gaurs are absent in all of Northern and western India and most of the Terai landscape as well.
What people tend to not realize is that Gaurs are not found all over India, but only the central-eastern and southern forests. That too they occur in high densities only in the Southern forests, which is why they constitute a bigger percentage of the tiger's diet there than anywhere else. Gaurs tend to prefer dense jungles and mountainous terrains. Some of India's best photographed reserves like Ranthambhore, Corbett and Bandhavgarh (I won't count that one herd) have no gaurs, and even in Kanha, tadoba and pench they don't occur at that high densities like in Bandipur and Nagarahole. That is why there are not many footage of tigers taking down gaur, since they are relatively rare and inhabit denser forests where photography is difficult. Same is true for the wild water buffalo. It is mostly extinct outside of Kaziranga where too it is outnumbered by rhinos and elephants. In fact, India has more elephants than gaurs and water buffaloes put together. 
Honestly a gaur is a powerful animal and its dangerous for even a big male tiger to take them on face to face and even by ambush. A careless tiger could find itself fighting for its life instead of securing a meal. However, on rare occassions, anything is possible (e.g. the young male leopard named Shica actually took on a veteran male warthog head on - its rare for a young leopard to take on a warthog and the account was posted by a poster named pparadus from the old ava).
Tigress and bull gaur both die in a fight
*This image is copyright of its original author *This image is copyright of its original author https://archive.org/stream/journalof373419341935bomb#page/950/mode/2up 
Tigers can have a successful kill, here is one case I found
The only animal, brave and strong enough to take on single-handedly a formidable Indian Wild Gaur is a Tiger. But still, it is not an easy task even for a mighty Tiger to kill a fully grown Indian Wild Gaur, four to five times its own size. For any carnivores animal in the forest, an Indian Wild Gaur is no doubt, a formidable opponent. Their menacing horns can lethally impale a Tiger or a Lion in a nasty face-off situation. The picture above was taken from the Mudumalai forest in Tamil Nadu a few days ago. We were told by our forest guide that they have received an information that the evening before a tiger had killed a mighty wild gaur a few miles inside the dense forest. As we were inching closer to the place where our forest guide told us the carcass had rested, we were in fact listening for any sound that would give us some indication about the presence of the Tiger who could have killed the Gaur last night and would certainly be guarding the kill, sitting somewhere in the proximity and we knew, he wouldn’t take kindly to our approach either. Later when we reached the spot, we could see the area was trampled with thick clumps broken like twigs. It was clear that both the beasts, one, the largest of all wild cats in the world and the other, the largest of all the wild cattle species had not backed out a little and it was a titanic battle between both. Whenever these two mighty animals fight each other, the outcome is not certain. Sometimes the Tiger will win and sometimes not. We waited there for a few minutes, watching the massive carcass and admiring the power of this mighty bovine. When we left the scene, feeling dejected by the whole episode, we knew, this is exactly the nature’s way of balancing the ecosystem or in other words, it's about the 'survival of the fittest'. Ajan R Nair December 26 - 2019 |
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