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The heaviest Liger ACTUALLY measured by Guinness (2014)
The heaviest Liger ACTUALLY measured by Guinness (2014)
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The heaviest Liger ACTUALLY measured by Guinness (2014)
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This topic provides the first verified measurements of a Liger, the largest on record according with Guinness (2014). Also, the topic can be used to provide a database about ligers and other cat hybrids.
This is the data according with the Guinness book of 2014:  *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 are more images of “Hercules”:  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author For comparison, here is the data of “Jaipur” the Amur tiger:  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author I scaled Joan smaller (in the body and in the head) than Moksha, but even then, the tiger Jaipur looks slightly larger than Hercules. You can make our own comparisons and you will see it. Besides, remember that some time before, Jaipur reached the huge weight of 465 kg (1,025 lb)!!! It seems that these two cats are indeed the largest captive cats ever recorded. However, normally ligers are heavier than most captive tigers and lions. As we can see, the often exaggerated body size of the Ligers (up to 360 cm in total length) is probably just that, an exaggeration. The largest Liger ever measured and verified by Guinness was no larger than the largest captive tiger ever recorded (332 cm (tiger) against 333 cm (liger), measured in straight line). It is true that the ligers are in fact larger than the largest wild tigers and lions, however captive specimens can and do match they sizes, although ligers reach more often the huge weights of up to 400 kg and are taller at the shoulders. With a total length of 333 cm and a shoulder height of 125 cm, ligers are truly giants and only the largest wild tigers ever recorded reached those sizes (330 cm in total length (Mazák, 1981) and 114 cm in shoulder height (Brander, 1923)). We can conclude that ligers are larger than wild lions and tigers, that captive lions and tigers can and do match they body size in extreme cases, but ligers are heavier in relation with its size, often weight up 350-400 kg, however, the largest captive tiger (Jaipur, 423 kg in 1986) was about the same weight than the largest captive liger (418.2 kg in 2013). Ps.: The lions that apparently measured up to 333 cm quoted by Nowell & Jackson (1996) and Guggisberg (1975) are fake and/or incorrect, and now I have the evidence to prove it. Other "giant" specimens: 1. Hagenbeck liger: The oldest and biggest of his animals was a hybrid born on the 11th May, 1897. This fine beast, now more than five years old, equals and even excels in his proportions a well-grown lion, measuring as he does from nose tip to tail 10 ft 2 inches (310 cm) in length, and standing only three inches less than 4 ft (114 cm) at the shoulder. A good big lion will weigh about 400 lbs - Mr Selous gives the length of a lion shot by himself as 9 ft 11 inches, its height as 3 ft 8 inches, and its weight as 410 lbs - and it is probably that in very exceptional cases lions may attain 450 and even 500 lbs. But the hybrid in question, weighing as it does no less than 467 lbs (212 kg), is certainly the superior of most well-grown lions, whether wild-bred or born in a menagerie.  *This image is copyright of its original author Source: ANIMAL LIFE AND THE WORLD OF NATURE, "LION-TIGER HYBRIDS" (June 1902-1903) by A H Bryden. Link: http://www.messybeast.com/genetics/hybrid-history.htm 2. Cubanacan from Guinness: The Calcuta Zoo first tigon was Rudhrani, born in 1971, was mated to an Asiatic lion called Debabrata and produced 7 li-tigons in her lifetime. Some of these reached impressive sizes - a li-tigon named Cubanacan (died April 12th, 1991) was believed to weigh at least 800lb/363 kg, stood 52 inches/1.32m at the shoulder and 11.5ft/3.5 m total length (1994: GBWR "largest litigon").  *This image is copyright of its original author Source: Guinness Book of World Records, 1994_Largest Li-tigon. Link: http://www.messybeast.com/genetics/hyb-tigon.htm http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Litigon 3. Unreliable specimens, no sources: In 1935, four ligers from two litters were reared in the Zoological Gardens of Bloemfontein, South Africa. Three of them, a male and two females, were still living in 1953. The male weighed 340 kg (750 lb) and stood a foot and a half (45 cm) taller than a full grown male lion at the shoulder. Valley of the Kings animal sanctuary in Wisconsin had a male liger named Nook who weighed around 550 kg (1,213 lb),[sup][citation needed[/sup]] and died in 2007, at 21 years old.[sup][citation needed][/sup] Hobbs, a male liger at the Sierra Safari Zoo in Reno, Nevada, lived to almost 15 years of age before succumbing to liver failure and weighed in at 410 kilograms (900 lb).[sup][citation needed][/sup] Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liger Commentary: These above records provide an idea of the real size of these giants. There are other sources that quote a height of 366 cm standing in the hind legs, but this is an unreliable form to measure a cat, and there are no records of wild-captive tiger-lions for comparison. The first two records were actually measured but they weights were just estimated. The first record show a specimen no larger than a wild Amur-Bengal tiger, however at 1897, a cat of that size in captivity was practically a miracle, as all the cats suffered of bad care in those Menageries. The second case is a double hybrid and presents the largest body size of ANY great cat in modern history. With a total length of 350 cm (straight line) and a shoulder height of 132 cm, this cat was of the same size than the largest Ngandong tiger (Panthera tigris soloensis) and Panthera atrox on record!!! Look his image and you will know how large these two Pleistocene cats were. The third record shows three specimens that are presented in Wikipedia with NO source. The first (340 kg) and the third (410 kg) specimens presents plausible weights and don’t surpass the actual record weight of Hercules (418.2 kg). At least, in the case of the 340 kg specimen, I found confirmation of the figure, so is reliable, check it out:  *This image is copyright of its original author Finally, the liger of AROUND 550 kg is clearly an estimation and an exaggeration. Sadly, webpages like “Ligerworld.com” not only promote the breeding of these hybrids but also propagate the myth of the existence of huge unreliable sizes, check this out: a. Their weight can easily surpass 1000 pounds. Ligers can gain a length of 12 to 14 feet which makes this animal a huge beast. Question: where is the confirmation or the specimens measured??? Were they sources are for this claim??? b. A liger in the 19th century was believed to be more than 1700 pounds. But this statement cannot be confirmed. However, a liger in Wisconsin had a weight of 1600 pounds. This weight is confirmed and ligerworld.com has confirmed it from authenticated sources as well. Question: Did the keepers actually weigh this liger or it was just estimation? Why Guinness doesn’t recognize this figure??? Confirmed by a page that creat a myth about healthy ligers that that state that ligers are “ambassadors” of conservation, well, that is the WORST source that we can found. c. One report suggests a liger of 1200 pounds, while another report suggests that in Wisconsin, there was a liger which weighed more than 1600 pounds. Question: Where are those reports??? A liger of 725.7 kg??? Only in them wild and sick dreams. Why no one, even Guinness, don’t knew about this cat??? Why only now than that liger is dead, they present this weight that can’t be confirmed anymore??? Source: http://www.ligerworld.com/size-of-the-ligers.html http://www.ligerworld.com/biggest-liger-...orded.html Finally, Ligerworld.org present a pretty list of liger weights, however they forget to say that ALL of them are just estimations (most of them very gross), sadly some people, even a few dear cat-fans in the AVA forum choose to believe this silly estimations that are not based in any facts. The famous liger Hobbs was estimated at about 900 lb (408 kg), and some people even dare to estimate him at 1000 lb (453.6 kg) but he seems no near as large and heavy as Hercules (418.2 kg). Check him:  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author With a tigress, he doesn’t look excessively large:  *This image is copyright of its original author Check this page about Hobbs: http://www.lionlamb.us/hobbs.html Conclusion: It is obvious that this pages like Ligerworld.com and some others fan-pages contribute to hence the myth of huge cats over 500 kg in captivity, besides, they promote the breeding of ligers like if they had some conservation value, with excuses like that they are “ambassadors” of the conservation or that they attract people that “donate” money for the “conservation” of tigers and lion in the wild. The evidence suggests that the male liger measure between 300-333 cm in total length in straight line and can reach a height of up to 130 cm. The weight is issue is a difficult business, but at this time, the heaviest Liger actually weighed in all history reached about 420 kg. All those claims of heavier and longer ligers most be treated like gross exaggerations, like the existences of white sharks of over 10 m in length or modern eagles of 5 m in wingspan. Sadly, I found only three skulls in the web, however, I think that there is something weird here, check this: 1. Length 17", width 11" – 432 cm by 279 cm. [img]http://schreckensart.homestead.com/files/liger_skull.jpg" class="lozad max-img-size" alt="" title=""> *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author Source: http://schreckensart.homestead.com/skullscats.html 2. Length 16 5/8" long by 10 7/8" wide – 422 cm by 276 cm.  *This image is copyright of its original author Source: http://www.angelfire.com/mi/dinosaurs/cats.html 3. Approx. skull length 17" – about 43 cm.  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author Source: http://schreckensart.homestead.com/NHbigcats.html I think that these three skulls are the same model, after all the three specimens almost match with them sizes. The problem is the use of inches, which like in “Bone Clones”, are only APPROXIMATED sizes, not the actual size which is better measured in millimeters or centimeters. Even taking the largest size, the top figure of 432 cm is just like the largest lion skull, so it is not enormously large. The figure is important and suggests, again, that the “large” size of the liger is more on the body weight than in the body size itself. Sadly, as we don’t know the actual size of the previous owner, we can’t compare it with other lion-tiger specimens. 
If you watch the documentory with Dr. Antle, he has hercules next to a 500lb male tiger and hercules is just massive. Couldn't imagine how large Jaipur would be.
Excellent post Guate. Thanks a lot for the time you take to post such extensive information. Though my reason simply tells me, that wild amur tigers never ever were and never ever will be as big as Jaipur. He was most likely neutered, which is typical for such extremely huge captive cats. Some abnormaly huge specimens could have existed as we have seen on the photo from the sungari river tiger. About 650-700pounds. His head and neck alone probably weighed as much as the hunter himself, who posed next to the tiger. The Duisburg Zoo tiger also seemed like a very, very big specimen. Probably twice the size or even more like the female next to him. take the average size of a wild female amur tiger (121kg), add a bit weight for the fact of captivity (10kg) and you get your estimation for the male, which should be around 570-660 pounds (double size of female or a bit more). But to get as big as this in the wild needs some serious genes and good prey density, I guess. A healthy amur gene pool and good prey density could result in specimens up to 700 pounds. But definitely few and far between. Some old photos from circuses also show some exceptional big male specimens (see attachement, they´re sitting and are almost as big as the standing man)! Specimens in captivity can only get even bigger when they are neutered, as far as I´m concerned. Less enviromental stress and a regular and good food supply in captivity simply doesn´t have such a big impact, even when you´re a tiger equipped with extraordinary genes. Again, thx for the post !!!
Thanks for your replies guys.
In fact, I don't know if Jaipur was or not neutered, there is no information about this and the picture don't give us a clue. However, what we can see is that both cats are extremally fat, so I guess that the best explanation of the weight of Jaipur is no other thing that obesity. About the wild tigers, of course that there are not tigers of that size in the woods, that will be imposible, nor even the giant Ngandong tiger (Panthera tigris soloensis) or the American "lion" (Panthera atrox) reached that huge body mass. If we use Bengal tigers as surrogates for the Amur ones, a healty average male in a proper habitat with good prey base, would weight 200-220 kg, with dominant males reaching 230-250 kg in the best cases. Animals of 280-320 kg are just very exceptional cases and only the most powerfull animals could reach this sizes.  (04-22-2014, 04:35 AM)'Wanderfalke' Wrote: Excellent post Guate. Thanks a lot for the time you take to post such extensive information. Though my reason simply tells me, that wild amur tigers never ever were and never ever will be as big as Jaipur. He was most likely neutered, which is typical for such extremely huge captive cats. Some abnormaly huge specimens could have existed as we have seen on the photo from the sungari river tiger. About 650-700pounds. His head and neck alone probably weighed as much as the hunter himself, who posed next to the tiger. The Duisburg Zoo tiger also seemed like a very, very big specimen. Probably twice the size or even more like the female next to him. take the average size of a wild female amur tiger (121kg), add a bit weight for the fact of captivity (10kg) and you get your estimation for the male, which should be around 570-660 pounds (double size of female or a bit more). But to get as big as this in the wild needs some serious genes and good prey density, I guess. A healthy amur gene pool and good prey density could result in specimens up to 700 pounds. But definitely few and far between. Some old photos from circuses also show some exceptional big male specimens (see attachement, they´re sitting and are almost as big as the standing man)! Specimens in captivity can only get even bigger when they are neutered, as far as I´m concerned. Less enviromental stress and a regular and good food supply in captivity simply doesn´t have such a big impact, even when you´re a tiger equipped with extraordinary genes. Again, thx for the post !!! How about Baikal? He weighs 850 pounds and has fathered several cubs. He is genetically pure Amur, neither he is neutered nor he is fat. (04-22-2014, 04:49 AM)'GrizzlyClaws' Wrote:Yes, that huge cat is ENORMOUS. Its head is massive and its body is well proportioned.(04-22-2014, 04:35 AM)'Wanderfalke' Wrote: Excellent post Guate. Thanks a lot for the time you take to post such extensive information. Though my reason simply tells me, that wild amur tigers never ever were and never ever will be as big as Jaipur. He was most likely neutered, which is typical for such extremely huge captive cats. Some abnormaly huge specimens could have existed as we have seen on the photo from the sungari river tiger. About 650-700pounds. His head and neck alone probably weighed as much as the hunter himself, who posed next to the tiger. The Duisburg Zoo tiger also seemed like a very, very big specimen. Probably twice the size or even more like the female next to him. take the average size of a wild female amur tiger (121kg), add a bit weight for the fact of captivity (10kg) and you get your estimation for the male, which should be around 570-660 pounds (double size of female or a bit more). But to get as big as this in the wild needs some serious genes and good prey density, I guess. A healthy amur gene pool and good prey density could result in specimens up to 700 pounds. But definitely few and far between. Some old photos from circuses also show some exceptional big male specimens (see attachement, they´re sitting and are almost as big as the standing man)! Specimens in captivity can only get even bigger when they are neutered, as far as I´m concerned. Less enviromental stress and a regular and good food supply in captivity simply doesn´t have such a big impact, even when you´re a tiger equipped with extraordinary genes. Again, thx for the post !!!How about Baikal? He weighs 850 pounds and has fathered several cubs. Check the next link, there GrizzlyClaws and I manage to estimate the probable proportions of the body of this large captive tiger: http://animalbattle.yuku.com/topic/21/bo...1W02VcXK8w (04-22-2014, 05:06 AM)'GuateGojira' Wrote:(04-22-2014, 04:49 AM)'GrizzlyClaws' Wrote:Yes, that huge cat is ENORMOUS. Its head is massive and its body is well proportioned.(04-22-2014, 04:35 AM)'Wanderfalke' Wrote: Excellent post Guate. Thanks a lot for the time you take to post such extensive information. Though my reason simply tells me, that wild amur tigers never ever were and never ever will be as big as Jaipur. He was most likely neutered, which is typical for such extremely huge captive cats. Some abnormaly huge specimens could have existed as we have seen on the photo from the sungari river tiger. About 650-700pounds. His head and neck alone probably weighed as much as the hunter himself, who posed next to the tiger. The Duisburg Zoo tiger also seemed like a very, very big specimen. Probably twice the size or even more like the female next to him. take the average size of a wild female amur tiger (121kg), add a bit weight for the fact of captivity (10kg) and you get your estimation for the male, which should be around 570-660 pounds (double size of female or a bit more). But to get as big as this in the wild needs some serious genes and good prey density, I guess. A healthy amur gene pool and good prey density could result in specimens up to 700 pounds. But definitely few and far between. Some old photos from circuses also show some exceptional big male specimens (see attachement, they´re sitting and are almost as big as the standing man)! Specimens in captivity can only get even bigger when they are neutered, as far as I´m concerned. Less enviromental stress and a regular and good food supply in captivity simply doesn´t have such a big impact, even when you´re a tiger equipped with extraordinary genes. Again, thx for the post !!!How about Baikal? He weighs 850 pounds and has fathered several cubs. He is also very athletic, just see how he can climb the tree with ease despite the huge size. Imagine a wild tiger with that size, then he will be the disputable King of Taiga.
These tigers are proof that they are capable of reaching that maximum size, but obviously that would mean that humans would have not been around to see them. No way they can exist while humans devast their forrests and destroy their prey sources. That being said, I think the ability to put on more fat than bengals allows siberians to get so massive. I have asked what the body dimensions of a big captive siberian are, so we can realistically compare them to the ones that exist today. For a siberian to have that kind of mass and be able to hunt in the wild, it would need to be exceptionally long, large skull and probably pretty tall at the shoulder as well.
Here is your request, this table have all the measurements that I have from captive male Amur tigers, including also those from peter.
 *This image is copyright of its original author About female specimens, I have only one from Heptner & Sludskii (1992) and two from peter. I have not made that table yet (it will be the No. 6). Hope this helps, I am going to put it also in the Amur topic. 
I agree with you Guate. If you look on the Google, many unreliable reports said Hercules is the heaviest non-obese liger, while Hercules clearly look obese if we look at the images of Hercules. It should be typed, "heaviest obese liger" instead of "heaviest non-obese liger". Ligers are heavier than tigers and lions only in general. But if we compare the prime examples of tigers and lions to the prime examples of ligers, actually there are only a little bit size differences.
Do you have any idea of the measurements of liger skulls?
Check the last part of my first post here. There are the only skull measuremens that I have found, on ligers.
Interesting that none of their skulls are exceptionally long, and the longest body Length measured 2200mm or 86'' has a skull length of 371mm or 14.6'' which isn't a abnormally large skull. Even the shoulder height and body mass isn't really out of the ordinary for these captive Siberians compared to wild counterparts.
What do you guys think? You can see that with such a few # of Liger skulls available they still show monster lenght on them. A larger sample size would probably show some larger and smaller #'s obviously.
At this day, the largest skull from a captive Amur tiger that I have found is that of the male CN5698, which had a greatest length of 393 mm (that table is from 2013, so I have not post that measurement yet). It seems that this male had a large head and a relative small body while No. 11 male had a large body but relative small head. Peter in other posts provided information that some captive Amur tigers were short with large heads and others long with short heads.
That liger skull of c.432 mm is the only that I have found (if we believe that the three skulls are in fact the same), so we can't compare them with other specimens. Even worst, we don't know the size and weight of the specimen in life. Compared with wild lions and tigers, it seems no larger than the largest wild lion skull and barely over 3 cm than the largest tiger skull. However, like I said before, we don't know the data of this particular liger, so we can't make comparisons yet. Until we have a larger database on ligers, all what we have are conjectures, and I bet that the skull from the tiger Jaipur is no smaller than that of the liger Hercules, just check the comparison image in my first post.
Its just to hard to tell when a skull is covered with muscle mass and fur. But in terms of captive or wild skulls, there really seems to be no differnece in size, but liger skulls do measure longer and wider, at least the 3 you posted. If the # of specimens increased, I am sure the max size would most likely increase as well. But it matters not, there is no such thing as a Liger, in the wild.
(12-03-2014, 12:20 AM)Pckts Wrote: Its just to hard to tell when a skull is covered with muscle mass and fur. But in terms of captive or wild skulls, there really seems to be no differnece in size, but liger skulls do measure longer and wider, at least the 3 you posted. If the # of specimens increased, I am sure the max size would most likely increase as well. But it matters not, there is no such thing as a Liger, in the wild. Rephrasing Guate's statement. @Pckts "I think that these three skulls are the same model, after all the three specimens almost match with them sizes. The problem is the use of inches, which like in “Bone Clones”, are only APPROXIMATED sizes, not the actual size which is better measured in millimeters or centimeters. Even taking the largest size, the top figure of 432 cm is just like the largest lion skull, so it is not enormously large. The figure is important and suggests, again, that the “large” size of the liger is more on the body weight than in the body size itself. Sadly, as we don’t know the actual size of the previous owner, we can’t compare it with other lion-tiger specimens." |
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