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

[peter]

(10-02-2018, 06:18 PM)P.T.Sondaica Wrote: @peter amba kill by male brown bear is real?

Shortly after you posted the question, I took a break of a week. When I returned, I was busy. Sorry about the delay.  

In 2010, there was a debate about Sysoev and his story ('Amba') in the thread 'Male brown bears are not out of the predatory reach of tigers if of similar size' (Animals Versus Animals, Yuku - Tapatalk today).

Alexious3, one of the most informed posters, thought the story could have been fictional, but he wasn't sure. He knew of 2 male tigers killed by male brown bears in the Russian Far East. One incident happened in 1960, the other in 1972. Apart from the fact that the tiger was an adult male, there's no info on the 1972 incident, but one of the posters involved in the debate, Grahh, posted a newspaper report (in English) about the 1960 incident.  

Rukovsky also reported about a fight between a male bear and a male tiger. The bear, described as a 'very large' individual, won and consumed most of the tiger. The skull later found in the snow suggested the tiger had been about 4 years of age. According to Alexious3, this incident could have been the 1960 incident described in the newspaper report posted by Grahh, but he wasn't sure. 

Sysoev's story ('Amba') was published after the 1960 incident. Alexious3 didn't know if it was based on that incident, but it could have been. In Sysoev's story, the bear was an emaciated 'Schatun' (a non-hibernating male brown bear). 

Sysoev's story has a lot of details suggesting he might have seen a fight between a tiger and a brown bear. Some time later, I read he had seen 4 fights between tigers and brown bears. In 2 cases, the bear won. In one, the tiger won. One fight ended in a draw. Again, I'm unable to say if the information I read is correct. 

There's a famous photograph of a diorama constructed between 1964-1966. Apparently, it was supervised by Sysoev. It could be that it was based on his story ('Amba'), but that again is only a guess. Here's the photograph of the diorama posted before:

*This image is copyright of its original author

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