Tigers of Central India

[Ashutosh]

Bandhavgarh is the scene for another strange tiger behaviour. We have seen Chota Bheem continuously with his 4 cubs from Tara while also mating with the Khatiya female intermittently. What we have been missing is Tara, the mother of the cubs and Chota Bheem’s mate since beginning of May.

Well, here is Tara seen with her newest litter of 2 cubs who are about 5 weeks old - she hasn’t been seen with her grown up litter in that time - whereas Chota Bheem has been bringing kills to the litter of 4 in essence being their full time carer. This litter of Tara has also been fathered by Chota Bheem.

What will be interesting to see is how this dynamic goes ahead with father looking after the older litter while mother is focused on the youngest ones.

This is the older litter who are left on their own and Chota Bheem (for now):

We also have Ra female raising a litter of Bajrang’s cubs while the Dhamokar female is raising Bheem’s cubs who is most definitely dead. The Darraha female is also raising a litter (most likely Bheem’s again). Kajri has littered recently whereas Spotty has just pushed her subadult males to leave her. Also, D1 has left Dhamokar buffer to try and push into Khitauli where he hasn’t been successful in dislodging any of the resident males yet. Reply