Who is the "king" of tigers? - Bengal or Amur

[GuateGojira]

This is also what I think. Amur tigers evolved from the Caspian tigers that traveled through Siberia up to the Far East. The principal prey of these original tigers was the wild boar, which in its habitat, reaches great sizes and is very strong. Caspian tigers evolved a huge sagital crest, very large canines and a relative short muzzle, which increased its bite strength. Then, the Amur tigers that invaded the Amur area found the same prey population but with other prey items that range from the red deer to the brown bear. In this case, Amur tigers kept those original adaptations and enlarge it, with even larger sagital crest, long but robust canines and a wider muzzle. Amur tigers are the top in the tiger evolution, separated from its original area (Caucasus) just about 200 years.

The only other tiger that follow this enlarge plan was the Bengal tiger, which invades India about 12,000 years ago, and found an even larger prey base, better territory and created a "big bang" in the Indian subcontinent, transforming it into its stronghold, despite the presence of the lion and the humans. The Bengal tiger developed the same body proportions of the large Amur tigers but they don't change its skull very much. Compared with the Amur-Caspian tigers, the Bengal ones have a very small sagital crest, slightly narrow muzzle and relative small dentition.

In this case, we can suggest that the prey in the northern areas, like the giant wild boar, have a much stronger skin than those of the southern areas, including the sambar and the gaur. In this case, the Amur tiger developed a much stronger bite and is possible that this help them in increasing its hunting success, which is over 50% in the Russian Far East (Sunquist, 2010).
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