B2 and Other Great Tiger Pics from India

[Ashutosh]

@Pckts, fair points. A few things I don’t agree with. Dudhwa has 40 odd rhinos, they are not a prey base, whereas Elephants shouldn’t be counted as one either across any tiger range (the numbers of elephants preyed upon are too small to constitute a prey base), plus the elephant numbers themselves in Dudhwa are a fraction when compared to Kabini or Rajaji. As for the temperature of reserves, Dudhwa is definitely cooler, but, amongst the Central Indian Reserves, Panna records the lowest average temperatures as it is the northernmost Central Indian Reserve and has lots of water sources including a big river flowing right through it (Satpura is the only other central Indian park with a comparable river through it).

I agree with your point about Pannalal not being the biggest, but he hadn’t even reached his peak as he was about 5.5 years old when he went missing, he was just entering his prime and if his size trajectory took after T3, he would have put on a lot more weight yet. I don’t know if he was poached like Chotta Munna or succumbed to a rival. Either way, a big loss.

As for comparisons with other parks, my prediction of Panna tigers and them reverting back to their old weights was based upon the size of females of Panna, rather than the males. You can compare the females of Panna to any other reserve from Central India, and they stack up favourably. Reply