Felids Interactions - Interspecific Conflicts

[peter]

(10-03-2019, 07:59 PM)Shadow Wrote: This footage is from some movie, but still from about 1:10-1:40 it´s pretty interesting to watch. That wild boar is quite big. From some other videos it´s easy to see in which situations and positions predators are in risk to get wounded, they do time to time fight so, that boars head is under their body, while both are standing and attack has happened frontal.

This video has been discussed at different forums. The tiger, who had just visited the dentist, was an actor. He also was an amateur in the department of wild boars. I think he was lucky to get away in one piece. I wouldn't use the video to get to conclusions on tigers and wild boars.  

A few decades ago, I saw a documentary about Amur tigers on a German channel. The Germans had hired a few hunters to help them find a tiger. The Russians told them about tigers and wild boars, but the Germans didn't buy the stories. They had been following the tracks of a young adult tigress for some days, when they saw the immense head of what must have been a big male wild boar. It was a fresh kill, as the head was lying in a pool of blood. The only tracks they found in the snow were those left by the tigress. She was the one who had killed the wild boar. As she was much smaller than the boar, the German again didn't believe the conclusion of the hunters.    

They were wrong.

A decade ago or so, a 'rehabilitation' center was started in Primorye. In the center, orphaned young tigers, often only a few months old, are taught how to hunt. When they are about 18 months of age, they're released. The collar enables researchers to follow the young tigers. The information collected in this way says the youngsters are good hunters. Not one of them perished in the Russian winter and all tigers avoided human settlements. The researchers were surprised to find that the young tigers were able to kill even big wild boars. And big is big in the Russian Far East. The Ussuri wild boar is the largest of all subspecies.

I assume you know that one of the orphans, also known as 'Putin's tiger', made headlines some years ago. The reason is he had killed 2 bears interested in his wild boars. One bear was too decomposed to get to conclusions, but the other was a 3-4 year old brown bear. I know a brown bear of that age is very different from an adult male brown bear, but the info I have says male (they thought one of the bears killed by 'Putin's tiger' was a male) brown bears of that age can be quite large in the Russian Far East.

There is good information about the size of Ussuri wild boars on the internet (referring to a number of studies), but photographs are interesting as well. Here's a photograph of G. Jankowski with a number of wild boars shot in the northern part of Korea in the early twenties of the last century. I thought he shot 21 wild boars. They averaged 420 pounds (190,51 kg.) exactly:

*This image is copyright of its original author

I'm not saying a wild boar doesn't stand a chance against a wild Amur tiger (tigers have been killed by wild boars in the Russian Far East), but tigers do seem to prefer wild boars over all other animals. It may seem remarkable that an Amur tigress averaging about 265 pounds (120,2 kg.) these days is able to kill a heavier wild boar, but wild tigers are professional hunters able to kill large animals.

I saw real fights between Amur tigresses and other animals in facilities and was amazed at what I saw. I'm not referring to strength, claws and teeth, but to something I would describe as sheer aggression and intensity. All big cats seem to have something special in that department. In captivity, nearly all big cats get to adulthood. In wild animals, only the most able and most clever get to adulthood. Luck no doubt is important as well, but ability often is decisive.

Only few had the opportunity to witness a fight between a big cat and an adversary able to inflict serious damage. I read a few stories and will post them when I have time. Reply