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Who is the "king" of tigers? - Bengal or Amur
Who is the "king" of tigers? - Bengal or Amur
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Who is the "king" of tigers? - Bengal or Amur
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I believe you are absolutely right, Gaute.
Very cool to see evolution up close in these big cats. Now the next question... What determines evoloutionary changes, more... Enviroment or Prey Base For example, we can say amurs evolved for the prey base, but the prey base evolved from the enviroment that caused it to have denser fur and more fat/muscle. Very interesting. Kind of like "which came first, chicken or the egg?"  (04-23-2014, 01:38 AM)'GuateGojira' Wrote: 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. Basically all modern Mainland tigers were descended from the southern population of the Wanhsien tiger around 75000 years ago, they were the survivors after the climate change caused by the Toba eruption. I just wonder how the common ancestor of the Caspian-Amur tigers ended up being evolved in the Caucasus region.  (04-23-2014, 02:14 AM)'Pckts' Wrote: I believe you are absolutely right, Gaute.Evolution is a tricky business, but following the path of a species we can get a better idea of how an animal change trough the time. Sunquist et al. (1999) in the book “Riding the tiger”, in chapter 1 (Ecology, behaviour and resilience of the tiger and its conservation needs), they make a pretty good analysis of how the tiger evolved, following the expansion of the great ungulates of Asia, specifically, the deer-boar-bovine species. In the case of the tiger, environment determines adaptation of the species but the evolution itself seems to be more influenced by the prey: they size, density and habitat preferences. About the fur, this seems to be not a particular characteristic from Amur tigers only. For example, in the Aurora Zoo, in Guatemala, we have three tigers all of them a mix of Bengal-Amur. The climate in my city is template but has a few picks of cold and warm. The tigers develop they coats depending of the climate and interestingly, while the two males develop relative heavy coats, the female (a white one) don’t present a large coat change. Other example are those Sumatran tigers that live in USA-Europe zoos, they DO develop heavy coats that make them look like small fluffy Amur tigers. Finally, check all the pictures of wild Bengal tigers with heavy coats in the Terai area and specially in Bhutan, where cold climate is just like that of Russia. In conclusion, the coat is just an adaptation of the climate, not a particularity of a subspecies, Kitchener (1999) show this and stated that the coat pattern is not a good predictor of “subspecies” separation. In conclusion, the prey is the principal trigger for tiger evolution. The secondary factor will be the climate and environmental issues. However, if some natural disaster or a dramatic change happen (like the Toba eruption), then the evolutionary way of tigers can be affected in a great way, but been a very resilient species, tigers can adapt themselves and survive. At this time, in about 2 million years of existence, the only true menace for tiger is the human been. (04-23-2014, 02:45 AM)'GrizzlyClaws' Wrote: Basically all modern Mainland tigers were descended from the southern population of the Wanhsien tiger around 75000 years ago, they were the survivors after the climate change caused by the Toba eruption.Well, the point is that when the new population of recently evolved China tigers –Panthera tigris amoyensis– (direct descendants of the Wanhsien tiger) began they expansion through the entire east of Asia, about 70,000 years ago, a single population of tigers began to travel through the north-west of China and about 10,000 years, the Caspian/Amur tiger ancestor managed to colonize Central Asia via the Gansu Corridor (Silk Road) from eastern China. Now in this new territory, the tigers adapted to the new habitat and developed all the necessary characteristics proper of the entire north-central Asian tiger population. This new place was full of prey, despite its desert-like habitat, particularly the wild boar (Sus scrofa) that in this area can grow up to 285 kg (Baskin & Danell, 2003). Sunquist et al. (1999) also believe that the wild boar population was the principal influence in Caspian tiger evolution, while the red deer (Cervus elaphus) population was the main influence for the expansion of the tiger trough Siberia and up to the Amur region. (04-22-2014, 11:17 AM)'GuateGojira' Wrote: Definitely, weight and body size are probably not related with canine length. In that case, a light but large bodied tiger with a big head will have large canines. Here is the canine measurement for a 45cm Panthera spelaea skull, it should be around 6cm from the gumline, so basically the same size as the modern African lion.  *This image is copyright of its original author
(04-22-2014, 11:17 AM)'GuateGojira' Wrote: Definitely, weight and body size are probably not related with canine length. In that case, a light but large bodied tiger with a big head will have large canines. The 6.7cm lion canines were measured from the skull, not from the gumline. http://animalsversesanimals.yuku.com/top...1gLvcJOXIV BTW, do you have the scan mentioned about the 14 cm Bengal tiger canine? (04-24-2014, 12:02 AM)'GrizzlyClaws' Wrote: The 6.7cm lion canines were measured from the skull, not from the gumline.Thanks for the clarification. Even then, this means that the canine of this captive lion was still slightly over 6 cm to the gum line. About the scan, I think this is the one that you want:  *This image is copyright of its original author The canine of this Bengal tiger was of 14 cm, which means a crown height to the gum of c.6 cm.
What a massive tiger. 61'' chest and 24'' forearm. Skull is shorter, but wider and taller.
Body is 8'' shorter, we would have to know the tail length to make a estimate. Did he weigh the 10'4'' tiger? (04-24-2014, 12:50 AM)'GuateGojira' Wrote:(04-24-2014, 12:02 AM)'GrizzlyClaws' Wrote: The 6.7cm lion canines were measured from the skull, not from the gumline.Thanks for the clarification. Even then, this means that the canine of this captive lion was still slightly over 6 cm to the gum line. Based on that ratio, then "Amur" from the Duisburg Zoo must have the entire canine length of minimum 17cm and maximum 21cm. Can't believe how impressive when his canines were shown as the whole. (04-24-2014, 01:11 AM)'Pckts' Wrote: What a massive tiger. 61'' chest and 24'' forearm. Skull is shorter, but wider and taller.Sadly, Hawkins did not weight any of his two tigers, so we can only guess in base of the chest girth. In this case, the short one is probably the heavier and with that chest girth, a weight over 250 kg is practically sure. Other sad point, he did not measured the tails of these two tigers, but if we stick to the fact that normally, the tail of the tiger is 1/3 of the total length (Mazák, 1981), we can estimate a head-body length of c.196 cm for the short one and c.210 cm for the long one. However, something tells me that the short tiger had in fact a very short tail. Sadly, we will never know. (04-24-2014, 01:29 AM)'GrizzlyClaws' Wrote: Based on that ratio, then "Amur" from the Duisburg Zoo must have the entire canine length of minimum 17cm and maximum 21cm.If we see the photo of that huge tiger, the head is huge and the muzzle is really big. I think that 21 cm is too extream for a tiger, even for a captive. Maybe the canines were up to 17 cm and the crown length was longer than a normal tiger. I could be wrong, I am just been conservative. (04-24-2014, 02:20 AM)'GuateGojira' Wrote:(04-24-2014, 01:11 AM)'Pckts' Wrote: What a massive tiger. 61'' chest and 24'' forearm. Skull is shorter, but wider and taller.Sadly, Hawkins did not weight any of his two tigers, so we can only guess in base of the chest girth. In this case, the short one is probably the heavier and with that chest girth, a weight over 250 kg is practically sure. Maybe the root isn't much longer, just the crown is longer. Since "Amur" might have a 43cm skull, while this tiger has a 40cm skull. So perhaps "Amur" has the canine root a bit longer. Maybe "Amur" has 18cm upper canines which are already comparable to that of Homotherium.
It is possible, but take in count that all this is just speculation at the moment. The only fact is that tigers (Panthera tigris) in captivity do have canines of up to 9 cm to the gum line and in the wild they reach up to 7.5 cm to the gum line.
I will try to found some data about the Homotherium, but in that case, I will prefer to create a new topic about Pleistocene cats and put this data there. (04-24-2014, 03:25 AM)'GuateGojira' Wrote: It is possible, but take in count that all this is just speculation at the moment. The only fact is that tigers (Panthera tigris) in captivity do have canines of up to 9 cm to the gum line and in the wild they reach up to 7.5 cm to the gum line. Excellent, the ideal way is to make a formula sheet to gather all the canine records for tiger and lion with the distinction between captive/wild specimens, gumline/skull measurement, etc. After the big cat canine, the next topic should be the big cat claw. Although this topic might be much harder to gather information than the big cat canine, but we do just put what we can find, that's it. [img]images/smilies/biggrin.gif[/img] (04-24-2014, 03:51 AM)'Pckts' Wrote: I would also be very curious about claw differences. According to Mazak, the Amur tiger's claws are 80-100mm long around the curve, so i guess the Bengals shouldn't be much different either. But the claw measurement is usually much less known compared to that of the canine, since the claw isn't part of the bone structure like the canine, that's why is harder to preserve. But i've seen many bear claws (just check my nickname [img]images/smilies/biggrin.gif[/img]), most of them around 4-6 inches, some exceptional ones over 7 inches, but never seen the 9 inches claws mentioned by the lairweb. While the big claw is much less familiar to me.
I would assume Polar bear claws are more closely related to Tiger claws than any other bear claw. The need to dig seems to take presedent for most other bear species, so there claws are geared towards that direction from what I have seen.
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