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Who is the "king" of tigers? - Bengal or Amur
Who is the "king" of tigers? - Bengal or Amur
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Who is the "king" of tigers? - Bengal or Amur
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Old vs New, what is the difference?
(Information updated with all the new modern measurements and weiights available) Whit this new wave of information, we got a pretty decent sample for body meausrements from Bengal tigers in modern days. So, taking this oportunity I decided to make a comparative between the old measurements before 1970 and the new measurements taken by scientists after 1973. Here is the table:  *This image is copyright of its original author Now, there are several points to analize here: 1 - The modern measurements are actually a mix of methods. Yes, we know that all were taken "over curves", but honestly that prase it tooooo wide and need especification. For example we know now that the tigers from Nepal were measured following an straight line (like if they were measured between pegs) according with Dr Sunquist and the single male from Tadoba was measured in the same form in front of cameras. Now, about the tigers from Nagarahole we still don't have confirmation, but knowing that Dr Karant worked with Dr Sunquist, we can guess that he used the same metod. Now, about the new tigers from Panna, there is still not a clear confirmation, and the picutres that I have from India shows that the measurements were taken in a form close to that of those from Nepal. But for the moment, I put in the notes that were taken "along the curves" and I leave it like that. 2 - These samples do not include Sundarbans, as most of the records are modern ones, so I try to kept the study only with mainland tigers for a fair comparison. Old records are only "between pegs", no over curves or skins were included at all. 3 - The sample of males from the old records was of 151 single males, three of them do not had tails. Now, the head-body sample included only 93 specimens. For females we have the same problem, a sample of 67 single females but only 28 had head-body lengthts. So, ir order to get a better frame of the real variation on this measurements, I used a sample of 82 males and 20 females and made a regression equation to check the relation between the head-body length and the total length. The results are these: HB - TL in males: y = 0.7045x - 9.5526 - r=0.78 HB - TL in females: y = 0.5718x + 19.449 - r=0.79 As we can see, the correlation may not be perfect but is strong (over 0.5) so at some point is relliable to reconstruct the HB from the TL, so I done it with all the specimens and that is why the table above shows 151 specimens with HB length (3 of them do not had tails at all). The same with females. Now, about the tail, the correlation in males is weak (r=0.37) but is stronger in females (r=0.68). however, tails are not important in our analysis, so I just made it from the diference between the TL and HB. Incredible, the diference between the values obtained with subtraction and those from the equation was close to the 97%, so no big deal with tails. This sample do not include the specimens from Brander as he only presented the averages and not single values. Now, this values as the close ones to a readl HB from all the sample, I will try to do this with the lions, specialy for South African population, as the HB of 191 cm "between pegs" is based only in the specimens with that particular measurements and exclude those that had only TL. So probably the value will be lower under this correction method. 4 - Modern specimens seems bigger overal than the old ones by an small margin. Under one perspective we could say that this is because the modern tigers were measured on the body and not with pegs, and that could be possible, however other posibility is the fact that modern records include only sexualy mature specimens from over 3 years old, while those from the hunting records include a pletora of specimens that were included as "adults" just because they looked big and that is something that I discussed before based in the statements of Brander himself and the measurements of juvenile tigesr from Nepal. That will explain also the higher weights. I hope you like this comparative tables. And is insterting to see that in historic specimens, the Amur tiger surpass the Bengal tiger for more than 10 kg in males and is about the same in females. 5 - Finally, in the modern records, the maximum that I used was 261 kg because the average of 214 kg include specimens adjusted for stomach content. If I used the real values, included the two of 272+ kg for tigers M-105 and M-126, the average will be higher. I will like to read your opinions, suggestions and more information if you have. Greetings to all.
Ok, I updated the images and tables again, with the weights of the Panna tigers. However I did not updated the measurements because I do not want to include measurements that are not clearly reported as "between pegs" or in "straight line". So, again, please save these images and drop the previous ones.
 *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author Now, in the tables of the modern records I did included the body measurements from the tigers from Panna and other locations. Been honest, in a scientific paper, the next tables will be the ones quoted as did not include any "hunting" record.  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author
I updated all the images and tables from the overall, modern and comparative records.
I deleted the old images that I posted in this month to avoid duplicity. If there is any doubt, feel free to ask. Greetings and cheers to all.  (01-28-2022, 09:12 PM)GuateGojira Wrote: I updated all the images and tables from the overall, modern and comparative records. I have seen a lot of calculations of Bengal tiger average weights from 199-214 kg, what is the final average weight of male Bengal tigers by all records.  (01-30-2022, 09:42 PM)acutidens150 Wrote:(01-28-2022, 09:12 PM)GuateGojira Wrote: I updated all the images and tables from the overall, modern and comparative records. Weights are fluid and it’s splitting hairs between those numbers. Anything with a real sample size is eventually going to bring it around 200kg. Tiger weights generally range between 180-272kg But of course there are runts and giants which can be smaller and larger than the weights mentioned. “Averages” really don’t mean much since there are small tigers that hold territory and large ones. I wouldn’t put so much emphasis on averages if I were you.  (01-30-2022, 11:11 PM)Pckts Wrote:(01-30-2022, 09:42 PM)acutidens150 Wrote:(01-28-2022, 09:12 PM)GuateGojira Wrote: I updated all the images and tables from the overall, modern and comparative records. Yup, and individual weights also fluctuate quite a bit on a regular basis depending on health, the season, when and how much they last ate, etc. Ranges are much more useful as a metric. (01-30-2022, 09:42 PM)acutidens150 Wrote: I have seen a lot of calculations of Bengal tiger average weights from 199-214 kg, what is the final average weight of male Bengal tigers by all records. Before to answer your question, let me give you a little insight about why we are calculating averages. The thing was this, at the year 2003, when I joined to the discussions about "tiger vs lion", there was not an study which had all the weights available, actually posters in the old AVA (Animal vs Animal) forum from YUKU did not used to much primary sources, Brander was used in a second hand source, Cooch Behar was ignored because Schaller said it was biased and Hewett was known only trough Mazák (al this is allready corrected, now we have the original sources and we know that Cooch Behar did provided records of his small specimens and are not biased). So in that moment, I started to compile all the available information about weights and after several years (yes, years, this was not made in one day), I compailed the first tables about the weights of Bengal tigers and also from the Amur tiger (thanks to the document of 2005 from Slagth et al. and Kerley et al.). After that, what I have done is just to enlarge the tables and try to depurate it from specimens that at any light are not adults, but the work has been ward and dificult, specially by the constant attacks of the tiger haters that will complain for anything, so I just decided to ignore them and follow the process in base of scientific documents as much as I can. Now, the last criticism was the method itself, which for many years was just to put the populations together and make a simple average, like most of the scientific paper do, for example Slaght et al. (2005) and also Kitchener and Yamaguchi (2010). Some posters said that they averages should be "weighted" so the last figures from lions and tigers that I posted use this method, which do not signifantly affect the results, and at the end, it provides a reliable form to take in count the size of the sample in the creation of the averages. Under this background and events, I can tell you that the calculated averages fluctuated in base of the sample size and the specimens used, the source (hunting or only scientific) and the method applied. So that is why you may see several averages from many people that started to calculate they own figures. From my part, I can guaratee that I tried to use only the corroborated information and excluded "record" specimens to avoid bias. Now, the points of Pckts and LandSeaLion are very valid, there is not a fix "average" figure that you can constantly quote, there are many variations that affect it, for example the particular variation of the specimens and the fact that while we can use the specimens available, there are going to be always "bigger" specimens and "smaller" specimens than what the ranges of our studies may show. There are other factors that we don't know from the huting records, like age and health status, and that is very important. This doesn't mean that the averages are unreliable, or that we should stop doing it. For the contrary, is important to continue working on them the check the variations and get a better idea about the size of a population. Check for example that in this form it was known the huge variation on size that the Amur tigers suffered, from been the largest cat to be now in the second place by a significant margin. So, at the end, you will not found a fix average and you should be carefull to which source you quote, as there is several people out there that try to create they own figures but they had a hidden agenda and they will ignore or include random weights with no justification, and sadly all this is not for scientic accuracy, but there are several fanatics in the internet that continue sperading lies just because they want to prove that they favorite animal is the best, this sick people (like BoldChamp, Catlion, StarFox, among others) are very dangerous people, not only decievers, but also people that hate an animal (the tiger) with no reason, and from my point of view they are as dangerous as a poacher in the jungle. Other thing is that we should use not only averages but also other type of measurements. For example with Bengal tigers we have two modes (190 and 227 kg) and in the frequency table we found that while the average is about 200 kg, the largest frequency is between 220-230 kg, which means that most of the males weight in that range. Now, about your specific question, I am with Pckts on this, the current data suggest that including all the reliable records from hunting and scientific sources, the average male weight about 201 kg and the average female about 131 kg. This sample probably include young animals or sick animals that we can't remouve (like in Brander, or small figures with no specific details) but we take it as part of the population. However this may change if we have more records in the future. I hope this answer your question and if there is any other doubt feel free to ask. 
Maharao Raja Bahadur Singh of Bundi with Ruth Shaw of Castlereagh
 *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author sorry if posted before , i was unable to post this in extinction thread so posted it here. (01-31-2022, 06:39 PM)GuateGojira Wrote:Thanks(01-30-2022, 09:42 PM)acutidens150 Wrote: I have seen a lot of calculations of Bengal tiger average weights from 199-214 kg, what is the final average weight of male Bengal tigers by all records.  (01-20-2022, 06:09 AM)GuateGojira Wrote: Forth, the tiger (or tigers as there were two) did NOT weighed 261 kg but they bottomed the scale of 600 pounds used by the team! This fact was confirmed by Dr Dave Smith and Dr Eric Dinerstein, which mention that both males weighed over 270 kg. In this case, IF the idea of Dr Yamaguchi was real, these males could weight as low as 227 kg, not the 215 kg that he proposed. But as we know that these males were obviously not gorged (and probably not even baited in the case of M-105), we can use the figures reported by Dr Sunquist (between 14 - 19 kg) to estimate its empty belly weight and using the figure of 272 kg as the real weight, the "empty" figure will be about 256 kg, but as the scale was bottomed, this shows that there was extra weight and they could have actually weighed no less than 260 kg "empty". Interestingly, the figure of 261 kg came from an chest girth-weight equation and the figure that I estimate is about the same, so the figure of 261 kg do not represent a single heavilly-gorged specimen as Kitchener & Yamaguchi (2010) suggest, but the weight of two big males empty belly. I wanted to ask a question regarding the two tigers of the terai that have bottomed the 272 kg scale. I've seen your estimate of around 10-11kg of stomach contents and your estimate of 261kg. But I have a question, is it true that this estimate of 261 kg is based on the only information of the weight we have of them (272 kg) and that if we actually really knew their weight, such as idk as example something between 276 - 281 kg would we have respectively 265 - 270 kg as a result of the type estimate? (03-28-2022, 02:38 PM)LoveAnimals Wrote: I wanted to ask a question regarding the two tigers of the terai that have bottomed the 272 kg scale. Let me see if I understand your question. So you are proposing that if we knew the real weight of these two Nepalese males, the real empty weight will be about 265-270? Well been honest the figure of 260-261 kg is the minimum posible based in the facts, and this is also assuming that they ate about 17 kg in the night, which seems high based in the data gatered by Sunquist (also remember that he says that none of this captured tigers were full or gorged). However, been honest, as we don't know the real weight of those large tigers, the real empty weight could be more than our estimations, and this seems the case with several tigers captured by Scientist in modern times.
That's right my question was this perfectly.
I totally agree, since as you told yourself all we can do is estimate their stomach contents only from what we have (272 kg, but in reality we know they weighed more) and that therefore if at 272 kg we get about 260-261 kg, if for example we knew that they actually weighed 276-280 kg we will actually get a bigger weight on an empty stomach. I do agree  (03-28-2022, 08:20 PM)GuateGojira Wrote:(03-28-2022, 02:38 PM)LoveAnimals Wrote: I wanted to ask a question regarding the two tigers of the terai that have bottomed the 272 kg scale. @GuateGojira @"LoveAnimals" You can also add the fact that animals were not always baited after first capture. M105 was captured multiple times so he perfectly fits the criteria to be not baited and tracked using collar. Also all the weighing equipment argument goes down the drain since they didnt use iron platforms to weigh the tigers. They rolled them onto a tarpaulin net and hung it from the hook of the scale. Such tarpaulin net would weigh 2-3 kg at most. 
Guate, Can you give breakdown on amur tigers weights per each reserve ?
Hunchun reserve Laoyeling reserve Huangnihe reserve Southwest Primorye Krai Sikhot-Alin Do you know any tiger weights captured in the first 4 reserves ? First 3 reserves are from China, other 2 are from Russia. Are all the amur tiger weights come from Sikhot-Alin only? It would be interesting to see the weights from other reserves. The tigers from other 4 reserves seem to be bigger than Sikhot-Alin tigers.  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author
(05-22-2022, 01:22 AM)GreenForest Wrote: Guate, Can you give breakdown on amur tigers weights per each reserve ? Sadly, all the modern records that I have came from Sikhote-Alin and the Ussuri reserve. No figures from China at this moment, not fully 100% confirmed at least. However, old records suggest that Manchurian tigers were among the biggest on record, so I am fully open to the idea that north China tigers can develop, with time, the large sizes that at this moment are only reported in India/Nepal. |
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