key point
- All tigers are meat eaters, however, depending on where the feral cat breed comes from, its diet may sometimes vary slightly.
- Most tigers eat a mix of deer, buffalo and pigs.
- In captivity, most tigers eat beef, chicken and rabbit.
Beautiful and fierce, tigers are the largest of the big cats. Most tiger subspecies are native to Asia and are now endangered due to unrestricted hunting, poaching and habitat destruction. As of 2021, there will only be between 3,062 and 3,948 tigers left in the wild.
However, tigers seem to do well in captivity if given proper care, and there are tigers in many zoos around the world. Some tigers are used in circuses, and some people even keep them as pets.
There are 10 subspecies of tigers, 3 of which are extinct:
- Bengal tiger
- Indian (Bengal) tiger
- siberian tiger
- south china tiger
- indochinese tiger
- malayan tiger
- Sumatran tiger
- Bali tiger (extinct)
- Javan tiger (extinct)
- Caspian tiger (extinct)
A large male can weigh up to 660 pounds and be 10 feet long. By comparison, the Sumatran tiger is eight feet long and weighs more than 300 pounds.
Both muscular and sleek, tigers are easy to identify because of their thick fur with an orange-yellow to brown base color with black vertical stripes.
Their bellies are white. The tiger’s coloration is thought to camouflage it as it stalks prey in the jungles where it lives. This cat has a ring of hair around its neck and chin, which is more prominent in males. Males are also larger than females. Tigers are solitary except for the mother who raises her cubs.
White tigers are leukocytic Bengals, which means they lack the pigment that gives Bengals their orange undertones. The base color of the white tiger’s fur is white, but still has the black stripes of the common Bengal tiger.
White tigers seem to grow faster than common Bengal tigers and tend to be larger. These tigers occur once in every 10,000 births, and their pale coloring can make camouflage in the jungle difficult. However, some people deliberately breed white tigers for circuses or zoos.
What food do tigers eat?
Here are some facts about tiger diets. The main animals eaten by tigers are moose, horses, buffalo, deer, pigs, cows and goats. Specific diets based on different types of tigers are listed below.
A Bengal tiger’s diet includes:
- bison
- Sambar
- Balasinghe
- buffalo
- Saro
- Chitar
- Takin
- wild boar
- pig deer
- gray langur
- porcupine
- Hare
- Peacock
- cattle and other livestock
- Humans (if everything else is scarce)
- elephant (rarely)
A Siberian tiger’s diet includes:
- Manchurian red deer
- siberian musk deer
- siberian roe deer
- sika deer
- long-tailed goral
- wild boar
- Little Asiatic black bear and brown bear
- Hare
- rabbit
- salmon
- pika
Diet for critically endangered South China tigers includes:
- wild boar
- pig deer
- gray langur
- Hare
- Peacock
- porcupine
- plush deer
- Sambar
- muntjac
- snake
- livestock
The diet of the critically endangered Indochinese tiger includes:
- Sambar
- elephant
- bison
- wild
- wild boar
- snake
- Langur
- muntjac
- porcupine
- pangolin
A Malayan tiger’s diet includes:
- Sambar
- barking deer
- Borneo bearded pig
- snake
- wild boar
- elephant and rhino calf
- livestock
A Sumatran tiger’s diet includes:
- mouse deer
- Ribbon pig
- Malayan tapir
- porcupine
- muntjac
- Big-eyed Pheasant
- pigtail macaque
- Sambar
What do captive and wild tigers eat?
Those who keep tigers in captivity need to ensure that the animal is eating a balanced diet, among many other factors that keep it healthy. Meat types fed to tigers around the world include:
- beef
- chicken
- rabbit
- pig
- goat
- horse
- camel
- donkey
- buffalo
- kangaroo
Ideally, the meat would be fed along with the bones and skin, as tigers would eat it in the wild. Food may also be coated with vitamin and mineral supplements, which tigers can lick off before eating. Facts about tigers in captivity include that a tiger is more likely to be obese than too thin, and that, on average, a male is fed about 15 pounds a day, while a female is fed 13 pounds of meat a day.
How do tigers hunt?
Tigers are top carnivores and predators, and they usually hunt at night, but they have also been observed hunting during the day. Like other cats (including pet cats), it is an ambush predator that will leap from hiding and simply subdue its prey before it kills it. A tiger will jump on the back of a large animal, knock it over, and then clamp its teeth around the back of the neck or throat. Tigers can run at short bursts of 40 miles per hour and leap up to 33 feet.
Tigers can subdue large prey simply by holding their teeth on the windpipe until the prey suffocates. However, tigers usually seek juvenile, wounded or old members of larger prey. A young, strong, healthy animal about the size of an adult bison (the largest cow in the world) can be dangerous.
If the tiger is hunting smaller prey, it will simply bite the animal by the nape of the neck, which can sever its spinal cord or major blood vessels, or crush its windpipe. A tiger can also swipe at a smaller animal and crush its skull or break its back. When the prey is killed, the tiger will drag it back into the bushes and eat it. Sometimes, if food is plentiful, tigers will share their prey with other tigers.
Tigers can go weeks without food and then consume as much as 100 pounds of meat at a time.
Do tigers have natural enemies?
Other than humans, tigers have no active predators that hunt them down. Cubs are sometimes killed by males they are not related to if the mother does not kill the invading male first.Ton
Few of the animals known to kill adult tigers are bears, crocodiles and packs of Asian wild dogs called dingoes.
Tigers coexist with other predators such as leopards, wild dogs, bears and wolves. Tigers are considered top predators, meaning they have no animals that target them. However, sickly or young pups can fall victim to other top animals.
I am broadly interested in how human activities influence the ability of wildlife to persist in the modified environments that we create.
Specifically, my research investigates how the configuration and composition of landscapes influence the movement and population dynamics of forest birds. Both natural and human-derived fragmenting of habitat can influence where birds settle, how they access the resources they need to survive and reproduce, and these factors in turn affect population demographics. Most recently, I have been studying the ability of individuals to move through and utilize forested areas which have been modified through timber harvest as they seek out resources for the breeding and postfledging phases. As well I am working in collaboration with Parks Canada scientists to examine in the influence of high density moose populations on forest bird communities in Gros Morne National Park. Many of my projects are conducted in collaboration or consultation with representatives of industry and government agencies, seeking to improve the management and sustainability of natural resource extraction.
