ON THE EDGE OF EXTINCTION - A - THE TIGER (Panthera tigris)

[peter]

TIGERS AND BEARS IN RUSSIA TODAY - III


1 - A RECENT PAPER OF K.N. TKACHENKO

Some months ago, while searching for new information on tigers and bears in Russia, I found an abstract of a paper published in 2012. 

K.N. Tkachenko, who wrote the paper, provided information on the diet of wild Amur tigers in an unknown region (the Bol'shekhekhtsirskii Reserve, just north of the city of Chabarowsk). Tkachenko followed 3 tigers (two males and one female) for about fifteen years and concluded tigers, even in a densely populated region, prefer wild animals over domestic animals. When exposed to too much (human caused) stress (after 2000), however, they (and the tigress in particular) changed their diet.

Although anything but perfect, I decided to post the two pages I scanned anyhow:   

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

2 - SOURCES

Tkachenko's findings contradict the results of other researchers to an extent in that he found that bears, and Himalayan black bears in particular, were an important food source (31,2%) for tigers all year round. 

When trying to find more on his paper, someone informed me on a post in a thread on bears and tigers in the Carnivora forum. This post has a long quote from Tkachenko's paper. As it was printed in a somewhat peculiar way and also missed a number of words, I decided to rewrite the entire part and add a few parts of the abstract posted above. 

The title of the thread in the Carnivora forum is 'Predation and interaction between ursids and tigers' and the name of the poster whose post I used is 'Canidae'. The post I used was posted on June 30, 2013. I remember reading that the paper (or parts of it) was (were) first posted in Grahh's forum ('Shaggy God'), but I can't confirm as I haven't visited Grahh's forum in a long time. Perhaps some of you can.


3 - THE REWRITE

I could say it is an original, but the summary below is based on the abstract of Tkachenko's paper and the part quoted in the post of poster 'Canidae'. I, therefore, decided to call it a rewrite.

The result is 5 pages. I only posted 4, because the last one went missing. I will try to find it.

The part of Tkachenko's paper quoted by poster 'Canidae' has no paragraphes. I decided to add them in order to enhance the readability, but one could also conclude they are superfluous. I also added a few words here and there. Most of what was quoted, however, wasn't changed.

Tkachenko's paper is interesting. Those parts I considered extra-interesting or remarkable were printed in blue.   

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

4 - ADDITIONS

a - When you want to know more on the size of Himalayan black bears in south-east Russia, go to posts 94 and 95. Remember the amount of individual variation in bears, Himalayan black bears included, is quite pronounced. Most adult males won't exceed 300-350 pounds, but some can be as heavy as an average adult male Amur tiger. The male shot by one the Jankowski's probably exceeded 440 pounds (200 kg.).

b - When you want to know more on how tigers hunt bears, go to post 54. Bart Schleyer followed tigers who hunted bears in the snow and was able to reconstruct what happened. The tigers usually had about a hundred pounds on the bears they hunted. All bears attacked were killed and all were killed with a bite to the base of the neck.

c - Tkachenko concluded the tigress he had followed for many years hunted bears without a shadow of doubt. There are more examples of tigresses hunting bears, but it seems to be the exception to the general rule. Or is it?

It is likely tigresses, more so than males, are targeted by bears. The main reason is tigresses often have cubs (potential food) and, therefore, hunt more often than males (even more potential food). If we add they are considerably smaller than male tigers, chances are most will get involved in disputes with bears near kill sites sooner or later. Not seldom, these disputes have a tragic outcome. As tigers eat what they kill, chances are these disputes have an effect on hunting behaviour in that Amur tigers, if victorious, more or less learn to hunt bears in this way.   

d - One of the most remarkable observations was black bears, although hunted by tigers, actively seek out tiger kills. Scavenging, so it seems, isn't a privilege of large bears. Reply