Why captive Bengals are smaller than Wild Bengals?

[Roflcopters]

It’s a combination of things, environment and surrounding are two of the biggest factors. for example, if those specimens were from the wild. a lot of us would have mistaken them for females or young sub-adults. they’re definitely nowhere near their wild cousins. in the wild, a tiger generally can do a lot better in the summer seasons and even then we see a few tigers that don’t retain their overall body-mass that they would normally have in the spring, fall or winter. Sangam from Kanha for example was skin and bones in the summer, the same male in any other season was considerably a lot bulkier. in the wild, they have the luxury to go and explore. plenty of water bodies for them to go around. in captivity, options are very limited and summer in India is generally very brutal. which puts them at a significant disadvantage, also remember tigers position themselves according to their environment. another example, T24 aka Ustaad of Ranthambore. when he was in the wild, he weighed 240kg on a 250kg capacity scale. same male in captivity was just a little over 200kg, 215kg to be exact. my friend who recently saw him thought he would be lucky if he weighed over 200kg now. 

Key factors

- size of the enclosure.
- background knowledge, what region the tiger came from.
- food intake but it’s not a decisive factor.



what’s your take on this @Rishi @peter @Pckts Reply