Tigers of the High Himalayas

[Ashutosh]

(08-10-2019, 04:34 PM)Rishi Wrote:

(08-10-2019, 03:17 PM)Ashutosh Wrote: How can they possibly tell if they are Bengal tigers or Indochinese tigers or some sort of mixture of the two?

There are no Indochinese tigers nearby in Myanmar, so they're assuming Bengal

But tiger subspecies fade into each other, not change abruptly. These Arunachal tigers may carry genetic materials of both... most likely closer to Indochinese than central Indian tigers, but not as close as northeast Indian ones.
.

As far as I know, there are tigers in Hukawng Valley tiger reserve in Myanamar, which is very contiguous with Namdapha in Arunachal Pradesh. So, an Indo chinese tiger dispersing from Myanmar into Arunachal and then into South Eastern Tibet is not a far flung possibility. The Northern part of Myanmar and upper parts of Arunachal are just so wild and barely explored, add the Tibetan part of Yarlung Tsangbo valley above Namcha Barwa and there is a possibility of tigers thriving here. Without further studies, it is tough to determine which subspecies they belong to. Who knows, maybe they are their own subspecies, because I remember they caught a couple of abandoned cubs from Arunachal and the cubs had no oscilli on the back of their ears and the ears were jet black with no white spots. The Hindu reported these tigers to be bigger than Bengal subspecies (I have my doubts about that because they were raised in captivity).

https://m.economictimes.com/news/environment/flora-fauna/grown-up-tigers-cant-be-released-from-park-arunachal-forest-officials/articleshow/63665866.cms

The male tiger in captivity weighs 300 kilos and the female weighs 200 kilos.

https://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/energy...867331.ece Reply