Tiger Predation

[LandSeaLion]

(06-26-2022, 11:43 AM)LonePredator Wrote:

(06-26-2022, 11:28 AM)LandSeaLion Wrote:

(06-25-2022, 05:24 PM)LonePredator Wrote:

(06-25-2022, 05:09 PM)LandSeaLion Wrote:

(06-25-2022, 12:22 PM)Roflcopters Wrote: I can’t believe this is even a debate, it’s always some bear fan in the mix that thinks these bears are some invincible creatures walking freely in paradise without ever getting touched but reality is far different than what some fanboys like to believe. for starters, sloth bears and tigers generally avoid each other and in a serious encounter between the two. sloth bears are nothing more than a food source for the tigers that specialize in bear killing. Ravan, Kala Pahad male of Pench, Charger (Pench), Wagdoh, Jabbar and countless Kanha males have been observed killing and eating sloth bears and this is just the tip of the iceberg, let’s say i’m reaching. just this month alone, T-120 of Ranthambore and the dominant male of Chuka beach in Pilibhit were both observed killing and feasting on sloth bears. so how rare is this occurrence, who’s dominant over what? pretty one sided debate if i’m being realistic. pardon the tone.

I don't think this contradicts anything that Pckts said, to be honest. Some tigers do specialise in killing sloth bears, and are incredibly good at it. Generally speaking though, sloth bears are only a minor component of a tiger's diet, and not because they are too small to be worth bothering with (after all, tigers are opportunistic predators that will hunt monkeys, birds and porcupines, and also love to prey on wild boar, which are roughly the size of a male sloth bear). Sloth bears can be extremely aggressive in their own right, making them a tough prey to take on - especially when they are mothers defending their young. Faced with this aggression, many tigers will simply back off.

(06-25-2022, 02:09 PM)LonePredator Wrote:

(06-25-2022, 12:35 AM)Ashutosh Wrote: Just like there are Gaur specialists amongst tigers, there are certain sloth bear specialists as well. One of the current ones is Ravan 1.0 from Satpura. The forest guards at Satpura said his territory used to be littered with sloth bear fur. Sloth bears are rarely present in high density where tigers are present (this was corroborated by a study). But, Ravan went out of his way to hunt them.

Another one was Charger of Pench (father of the famous Mataram). Apparently, he had an appetite for the furry bear. Sloth bears have insanely long claws (longer than tiger’s claws) that they use for digging and as a defence mechanism. One slash would leave a tiger incapacitated which would very well mean death. So, I am guessing they are only a certain number of tigers which view them as prey (mothers protecting cubs not withstanding).

Bear claws don’t work like that. Bear claws are extremely blunt to such an extent that Bears rarely even use claw strikes in a fight unlike Tigers and Lions.

A claw strike from a Sloth Bear is unlikely to cause any serious damage to a Tiger.

Sloth bear claws are long and scimitar-shaped, like those of a sloth (which, funnily enough, is partly why they're called sloth bears). Their primary purpose is to split rocky termite mounds open; however, they are certainly long and strong enough to be able to inflict serious injury.

*This image is copyright of its original author

A large sloth bear was suspected by officials and a veterinary team to have been the reason for an old male tiger's death in Dudwha a few years ago for precisely this reason:

Quote:BAREILLY: A tiger found dead in a water hole in Dudhwa range of Dudwha National Park on Sunday may have been killed by a sloth bear, suspect Dudwha officials. While no pugmarks of another tiger were found around the water hole, images of a huge sloth bear have been captured by camera traps set 150 metres from the spot. The bear had a few scraches on its face and seemed to be moving about with difficulty.

"The nature of injuries on the neck and head of the tiger suggest they may have been caused during an attack by a sloth bear," said DTR field director Ramesh Pandey. The autopsy report submitted on Monday had said the tiger was killed by a "large carnivore" but did not specifically say it was another tiger.

Though a tiger being attacked by a bear is rare, Panday recalled an incident reported from Tadoba National Park in Maharashtra in 2018 when a male tiger, 'Matkasur', had picked up a fight with a sloth bear near a water hole. The fight was captured on camera by a tourist.

"The video showed the tiger was resting in the water when the sloth bear arrived with its cub. It fought with the bear possibly trying to defend its territory. But Matkasur lost the fight as it struggled to grip the bear's thick fur. Fortunately, the tiger survived," the field director said.

Pandey suspects that in Dudhwa, too, a similar situation arose. But in this case, the tiger was aged as it was over 12 years old. Such tigers are often thrown out of their territory and sometimes reside around water holes due to easy availability of prey. "This tiger may have fought with the sloth bear for dominance over the water hole as in Tadoba. However, this is not the final conclusion. We have also sought pictures captured by camera traps in Dudwha range during tiger census of 2018. This will help us in identifying if any other tiger is in this area.

"A bear is quite a powerful animal and its claws may cause deep wounds on the tiger's body," Pandey said.

Daksh Gangwar of Wildlife Trust of India, who was part of the veterinary team that conducted the autopsy, said, "The injuries were caused by a large powerful animal, possibly a carnivore. Such injuries can also be caused by a sloth bear because it has strong claws and can inflict serious injuries on a tiger."

(Side note: why are people so fixated on "vs" fights between tigers and bears? It feels like this topic has dominated most conversations about tigers on the board, including the "Premier" thread in the Edge of Extinction section.)

Scimitar shaped but not scimitar sharp. Their claws are extremely blunt and have a rounded end unlike felid claws which are sharp and have a pointy end.


Bears rarely even use their claws in a fight which tells those claws have little to no use for the purpose of fighting.

A slash from a Bear’s claws are not going to cause much damage to a Tiger but I doubt a Bear would even think of striking a Tiger with its claws because Bears simply don’t fight like that.

Firstly: they don’t need to be scimitar sharp to do damage. Did you not read the link I posted? A veterinary team that conducted an autopsy on a dead tiger in Dudwha said that it was very likely the injuries could have been caused by a large sloth bear’s claws (and such a sloth bear was seen on a camera trap nearby, with its own set of injuries).

https://m.timesofindia.com/city/bareilly/dudhwa-tiger-may-have-been-killed-by-huge-sloth-bear-officials/articleshow/68912576.cms

Secondly: yes, bears absolutely can and do attack like that. There are reports in the medical literature of the damage that sloth bears do with their claws when they attack unfortunate people, whom they perceive as a potential threat:

Quote:Most of the patients were middle-aged males [Table 1]. Only sloth bears were involved in all attacks. The mechanism of bear attack was mostly from the front with clawing in a high velocity swinging motion. The majority patients were referred to us after 24-48 h [Table 2].

Quote:Three species of bear are found in India, the Himalayan black bear, the brown bear and the sloth bear. Nagpur, which is surrounded by large number of forests, is a habitat only for sloth bears (Melursus ursus ursinus). They are medium-sized bears, with an average weight of 130 kg, 2-3 ft high at the shoulder and a body length of 4.6-6.3 ft. They are primarily nocturnal in nature and hunt for the food during the night. Their ideal habitat is a forested area with rocky outcrops. They mainly eat fruits, tubers and insects with special liking for Mahua flowers. Sloth bears probably view humans as potential predators, as their reactions to them (roaring, followed by retreat or charging) are similar to those evoked by the presence of tigers and leopards. The female sloth bear is most dangerous when she has babies with her and can attack immediately without provocation.[3,4]

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4413493/

Here’s an extremely graphic example of the damage inflicted by a paw swipe between two larger bears (this was an encounter between bears “Ted” and “Ugly” in 2007):

*This image is copyright of its original author

Stop twisting the words. The autopsy report did NOT even mention Sloth Bears. The autopsy report simply said that the Tiger was killed by a very large carnivore. And that could only be another Tiger.

Only this news article says that Sloth Bear would have killed the Tiger. Again, those are the  words of this news article NOT of the autopsy report. The autopsy report only said that the Tiger was killed by a ‘large carnivore’.

Oh you are hopeless.
For the benefit of others reading this thread, here is the quote I was referring to:

Quote:Daksh Gangwar of Wildlife Trust of India, who was part of the veterinary team that conducted the autopsy, said: "The injuries were caused by a large powerful animal, possibly a carnivore. Such injuries can also be caused by a sloth bear because it has strong claws and can inflict serious injuries on a tiger."

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city...s?from=mdr

Quote:When people present similar cases of Tigers killing Brown Bears (such as the one from Batalov where Batalov EXPLICITLY stated that the Tiger killed the Bear unlike in this case) then you are quick to deny those, but you don’t do the same when it happens the other way around.

Why do you quickly accept the case that the Sloth Bear killed the Tiger but you quickly deny the case when an Amur Tiger killed a large male Brown Bear?? This means you’re being biased.

What are you even talking about? You mean this post of mine in the Amur Tiger thread? The one where I was skeptical of the details of a fireside story told by a hunter/trapper with a very fantastical description and no evidence other than his words? And where I concluded:

Quote:(I’m not actually denying that a tiger could ambush and kill a bear, incidentally. I also think these stories are fascinating in the sense that they give an insight into how strongly the hunter/trapper living in the area feels about tigers (though also unpleasant to read, given that he describes hating and killing them mercilessly), which is why they’re included in the book. I just wouldn’t place as much credibility in them as I would a scientific report or paper!)

Gosh, how silly of me...

As for the rest, I'm not going to bother. This is a tiger predation thread, not a "tiger vs bear" thread, and this has already gone far enough off topic.

You are also a highly aggressive, combative and rude individual, as demonstrated at numerous points in time against multiple people. Reply