Experience with Wild Cats

[peter]

(06-30-2014, 02:47 AM)'Pantherinae' Wrote:

'Pckts dateline='' Wrote: Nice info. I definitely would not say "fairytale weight" for the simply fact of Madla being 260kg+ just to use a recent tiger and Kaziranga tigers are definitely larger than madla. 40kg's more is definintely possible IMO.

Eye witness who Photographed KZT023 said he was larger than any tiger he had seen in Tadoba. 
Waghdoh, Jai, Bamera where all stated by name as wel.
It's on here if you haven't seen it.

Anyway,
I bet that Koning male is massive, probably close to 250kg+ if he is larger than Bamera. It is probably also really hard to tell exactly because they carry weight differently as well as distant from each animal.
Thanks again. 






 

Well it's sad that we can only estimate the weight of Madla, but sure a massive tiger! My dad has seen alot of tigers and lions, and he said following weights on animals in his estimates, all notch boys where between 185-210 kg, B2: 210-220 kg (he said he was massive, but extremly short), T-24: 220-235, bamera: 225-240 kg, koning male 230-245 kg, and he said wagdoh where maybe 240-260 kg. 

KZT-023 is a massive beast, but he is a little, fat! He is looking like a very big framed tiger, but his hips do look a little thin. I have seen even more impressive tigers from Kaziranga ( but that's on camera traps, and thats a little hard to estimate size from)! They are definatly the biggest cats alive, but still 300 seem a little to much IMO, but who knows if they exists that's probably in Kaziranga. 
You do hear of lions from mount Kenya who is 270 kg, but to me it's a little to extreme, if there do exist lions at 270 kg's that's probably in Okavango delta! But probably not. 

BTW i respectb you're knowledge of cats, and it's fun to discuss with you! You seem fair, and do not seem to be a fanatic at all, and that's how it should be, no lion or tiger fanatics, who try's to make the other animal look bad, that makes me angry and sad. They are both fantastic and amazing animals! 

 





 

Interesting numbers, Pantherinae. A captive adult male big cat of 400 pounds (181,44 kg.) in good shape is an impressive animal. A 500-pound (226,8 kg.) cat is real big and 600 pounds (272,16 kg.) is immense. 

There are no pure Indian tigers in European zoo's as far as I know, but there are plenty of Amur tigers and they top the list for averages. Prime males average 480-500 pounds according to Eagle Raptor (a poster at AVA who had personal experience with captive Amur tigers and weighed quite a lot of them), but there is a lot of individual variation (healthy males in good condition range between 350-600 pounds roughly, with some up to 700). In the seventies and eighties of the last century I saw some that could have been bigger, but these Amurs (probably descendants of the wave of Amur tigers shipped to Europe after World War Two) are gone forever, I think.

There isn't much to choose between extra-large lions and tigers (in captivity), but tigers of large subspecies do 10 feet straight and 550 pounds empty more often than lions. One reason could be size pays in solitary big cats and not in social big cats. It's more outspoken in wild animals than in captive big cats, because apex-predators have to respond as fast as possible to the local conditions. In general, lions seem to do quite well in captivity, whereas tigers don't.

Your dad's estimates seem quite close, but he could be a bit low on some of the Indian tigers. As far as I know, 20 males or thereabout have been weighed in India. Of these, two (in Nepal) exceeded a 600-pound scale, whereas two in Central-Indian reserves exceeded 550 pounds according to experienced researchers. The Nepal males didn't seem that massive, but they were long. Central India tigers often are massive animals.

I'm not surprised at 500-plus Kruger lions, but I have some doubts as to alleged size of the Okavango water-lions. In wild big cats (and tigers in particular), there seems to be a strong correlation between total length and weight.

I'm interested in your dad's experience. Could you give us a bit more?

To finish the post, a few pictures of 2 captive European Amur tigers and 2 wild lions. All large to extra-large:


1 - Okavango male on his way to work. The Jouberts, in their great book on Okavango lions and Cape buffalos, offered a lot of great photographs. This male seemed average in length, but he was massive. I'm not sure about his size. I do know water-tigers (referring to Vietnam and the Sunderbans), when there were still plenty of 'm, apart from a few exceptions, usually were shortish and massive. But they didn't hunt buffalos, at least not for a living:

*This image is copyright of its original author

 


2 - The famous Duisburg Zoo male Amur tiger. In his prime, at 320 cm. in total length straight and 110 cm. at the shoulder (standing), he was estimated at 280-300 kg. by Dr. Gewalt (who measured the tiger when he was sedated for treatment).

He was born in Rotterdam Zoo. I saw his dad when he was close to the end. He was tall, very long and had a large skull, but was definitely below 300 pounds. To say he was thin as a rail would be an understatement. When captive tigers get real old, they often are reduced to skin and bones just before the end. I never saw this in captive lions. Anyhow, his son was plenty big in his prime:

*This image is copyright of its original author

  

     
3 - Male Amur tiger in a Slovak facility. I thought it was called Tiger Oasis, but you have to ask Amnon, who first posted this picture. This is close to the two very large Manchurian tigers I saw in the seventies, although they seemed more massive.

Tigers in Korea, Manchuria and south-east Russia all are Panthera tigris altaica and the genetic difference between them and Caspian tigers is close to zilch. Based on what I read and found, Manchurian tigers could have been the largest, closely followed by south-east Russia. Confirmed in today's tigers, as those in north-east China seem to be a bit heavier than those further north. A question of food, I think.

Manchurian tigers disappeared in the last century. The Jankowski's shot a very large male in 1943. After the war, China lost its tigers. In the fifties and sixties, the Russians caught and exported a lot of cubs. Some of these could have been from Manchuria, which was occupied by the Russians in 1945. They seemed to be different from those captured in Sichote-Alin, but it could have been individual variation. I don't know. I do know some of these cubs grew into prehistoric monsters. They disappeared in the eighties.
       

*This image is copyright of its original author

 

  
4 - Wild male lion (southern part of Africa). There was a lot of talk about his weight on different animal forums. One reason is animals of his size are few and far between. But they are there and they are, just as in captivity, close to the largest tigers. The difference in weight between extra-large animals of both species is, I think, due to a difference in total length and fore-limbs. Extra-large lions have extra-large skulls and big chests, but they are a bit shorter and lack the very massive fore-limbs seen in some wild male tigers. The reason is tigers need them, whereas lions need something different.

I'm not sure about this one. I thought they said 280 kg., but there was, ehhh, some difference of opinion regarding the reliability. Difficult to assess from a picture. But there's no question he is big: 

*This image is copyright of its original author

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