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

[peter]

What to say about the wild male Korean tiger of 270,5 cm. (just over 8.10) and 142 kg. (314 lbs.) in the previous post? Here's some old photographs (from Baikov) of Korean male tigers:


1 - Young male tiger shot in 1912 in the northern part of Korea by hunter Charaeff. This tiger was 288 lbs. (130,37 kg.):

*This image is copyright of its original author

2 - Another Russian trapper with a male tiger shot in the northern part of Korea in 1912. This male was 10.8 (325,12 cm.) 'over curves' and weighed 361 lbs. (163,75 kg.):
 

*This image is copyright of its original author

3 - Trapper Charaeff again with a tigress of 306 lbs. (138,80 kg.) and a 3-year old male tiger of 324 lbs. (146,97 kg.) he shot near a railway station in the northern part of Korea in 1912 (male at the right):

*This image is copyright of its original author

4 - This is Baikov himself (in the centre) with a male tiger shot in the northern part of Korea in 1911. This tiger, at 560 lbs. (254,0 kg.), is the the heaviest accepted by biologists today:

*This image is copyright of its original author

5 - Compare the 560 lbs. tiger above with the tiger in the photograph below. This tiger was shot in July 1943 near the Sungari River (Manchuria). At 11.6 'over curves', he was 2 inches shorter than the tiger above (see -4-), but the photographs shows a more robust animal. 

Those who shot, measured and moved the Sungari River tiger, all as experienced as they come, thought he was at least 300 kg. (662 lbs.). He was, by far, the largest tiger they had ever seen. There are more reports about wild Amur tigers of this weight, but this is the only one of which a photograph was made. Unreliable as not weighed by a biologist, modern biologists recently concluded. True, but there is this photograph and it shows an animal that easily compares with captive Amur tigers of similar weight.    

*This image is copyright of its original author

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