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

[peter]

TIGER SUBSPECIES - PART 1 ('Der Tiger', V. Mazak, 1983)


In the thread on Panthera tigris sondaica, Guate asked for a few scans of the book mentioned above. They were posted. When he said he wanted more, I decided to post the scans in this thread. 

Remember the book of V. Mazak ('Der Tiger') was published in Germany. It is in German, that is. If you want to read all of it, you'll have to use the translator. 

As to the measurements in the book. Mazak only used measurements taken 'between pegs'. He measured all skulls himself. The tables he constructed are used in many books. The overview still is the best I saw. Here we go.


01 - The Indian tiger (Panthera tigris tigris) 

On the left page, Mazak wrote he only used measurements of tigers measured 'between pegs' for his book. The right page is on the Indian tiger (Panthera tigris tigris). The photograph of an adult male Indian tiger (captured near Bhopal) in the Prague Zoo was taken by Mazak himself:

*This image is copyright of its original author

02 - The Indian tiger (Panthera tigris tigris) - continuation

The photographs on the left are from the book of Bengt Berg ('Tiger und Mensch', 1934). Berg was one of the first to use camera traps to take photographs of wild tigers: 

*This image is copyright of its original author

03 - The Indian tiger (Panthera tigris tigris) - continuation 

The tiger in the photograph is a captive male from the Regent's Zoo (sixties of the last century, London). He had a small mane. The skull on the right shows the profile typical for many wild male Indian tigers:

*This image is copyright of its original author

04 - The Indian tiger (Panthera tigris tigris) - continuation

On the left page is another skull of a wild male Indian tiger. The right page is the start of the Indochinese tiger (Panthera tigris corbetti). The tiger (a male) in the photograph was caught in the northern part of Vietnam and was kept in the Paris zoo. The photograph was taken in 1968:

*This image is copyright of its original author

05 - The Indochinese tiger (Panthera tigris corbetti) 

The skin on the left page is that of a male tiger from the northern part of Vietnam. The skull (all drawings were made by Mazak) is that of a male tiger from Quang Tri (Vietnam), 1968. I remember there was an expedition to what was then North-Vietnam in 1968. Mazak wasn't there, but his collegues returned to Prague with a lot of information.

The table with the skull measurements is topped by the same skull others mentioned (well before WWII). I'm not sure, but think this skull is from Johore (the southern tip of Malaysia). If correct, it shows Malaysia had large tigers a century ago.

Mazak was the one who proposed to distinguish between Indian tigers and those in southeast Asia. His proposal was accepted in 1968. From then on, tigers in southeast Asia were Panthera tigris corbetti (named after Jim Corbett): 

*This image is copyright of its original author

06 - The Chinese tiger (Panthera tigris amoyensis)

The photographs are from captive males in the Prague zoo (bottom left) and the Berlin zoo (bottom right). The tiger on the left was from central China, whereas the one on the right was from south China:

*This image is copyright of its original author

07 - The Chinese tiger (Panthera tigris amoyensis) - continuation

The skull (right) belonged to a male from northern China:

*This image is copyright of its original author

08 - The Caspian tiger (Panthera tigris virgata)

The table (top left) has skull measurements of China tigers. It's the only table I know of. Based on what I have on the Java tiger, I'd say China tigers had slightly longer skulls, although those from Java could have been relatively wider. Although Mazak only measured 3 female skulls, one of them is as long as that of an average Amur tigress. Remarkable. I have reliable information on the size of China tigers and do not doubt they were larger than Java tigers. They also showed more variation, but this was to be expected (China is much larger than Java). Also remember Java is an island. Islands mammals often show little individual variation. Same in Javan tigers. 

The Caspian tiger compares to the China tiger in that the region they inhabited was very large. I do not doubt there was quite a bit of regional variation. The typical location regarding Caspian tigers is Mazanderan (northern Iran): 

*This image is copyright of its original author

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