Tiger Predation

[Pckts]

A good video of the whole incident

Arpit Parekh

We started our morning at Kanha Tiger Reserve by entering through the Khatia Gate. As we drove deeper into the forest, we came across some fresh pugmarks of a male Tiger, which had walked on the forest track a few moments before, and we immediately started scanning the forest on either side of the track to see if we could catch a glimpse of the cat. As the forest opened up into a small grassland patch, we came across the huge male Tiger, popularly known as Yuvraj, calmly sitting in the grass. We immediately started photographing the Tiger, but the Tiger continued glaring across the grassland, taking little heed of the our vehicle which has arrived on another peaceful scene. Never in my wildest dream could I have imagined what we witnessed next. After about 10 minutes of posing for us, the Tiger got up and crossed the grassland and moved into the bushes, where a herd of Gaurs had vanished into just moments earlier. (Gaur is the largest wild cattle species in the world, with males often touching 1,000 kgs in weight.) The Tiger walked calmly across the grassland, his body language in no way suggesting that he was stalking the Gaur. But the Tiger was indeed stalking, as he came out from the other side of the bushes, amidst the chaos created by all the Gaur simultaneously running out from the bushes, grasping tightly on the neck of a sub-adult female Gaur. This was a rare natural history moment we were witnessing. The huge bull Gaur from the herd came in charging at the Tiger, but owing to their poor eyesight, ended up scooping the female Gaur in the air. The agile Tiger not only evaded the bull Gaur’s attack, but caught hold of the female Gaur again before she could regain composure. The female Gaur struggled for a few more, very long minutes, whilst the bull Gaur tried to nudge her, hoping to coax her to stand and fight. But his attempts were in vain, as the female Gaur eventually breathes her last and succumbed to the Tiger’s ‘deadly’ grip. Tiger usually prefer to hunt in dense bushes and woodlands, as their steps help them blend in and their agility helps them maneuver through the thickets. So witnessing a hunt in the open like this is definitely an uncommon moment of natural history that I was able to capture!

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