Tiger (redirected from riding a tiger)

tiger, large carnivore of the cat family, Panthera tigris, found in the forests of Asia. There are six subspecies of P. tigris: Amur or Siberian, Sumatran, Malayan, North Indochinese, Bengal, and South China or Amoy. The differences in subspecies are defined for the most part by their ranges. Amur tigers, commonly called Siberian, are native to the area of the Amur River in China, North Korea, and Russia. The Sumatran tiger is found only in Sumatra, the Malayan on the Malay Peninsula, the North Indochinese in parts of Indochina and S China; the South China tiger in central and E China, and the Bengal tiger in India, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Myanmar. Their habitats range from mountain forests to equatorial rain forests.

Tigers are the largest species of the cat family. Male tigers are generally about 8 to 10 ft (2.4–3 m) long, including the 3-ft (1.8-m) tail. The Siberian tiger may be 13 ft (4 m) long, including the tail, and weigh 650 lb (290 kg), much larger than any lion. The coat of the tiger is orange-yellow with numerous prominent black stripes; black and albino specimens are sometimes found. The Siberian tiger tends to be the lightest in coloring. The male tiger has no mane comparable to that of a lion, although it may have a ruff around the sides of the head. Tigers and lions are quite similar anatomically and can be interbred.

Tigers are solitary animals and usually hunt at night. A male tiger will have a large range that will overlap with the ranges of several females. Females give birth to two or three cubs, which they raise and train for about two years. Tigers kill a variety of animals, including deer, antelope, wild pigs, and cattle. Tigers try to remain out of sight and hearing of their enemies, especially humans; they prefer fleeing to fighting. They can be killed by wild dogs, elephants, and water buffalos. Man-eating tigers are usually individuals who are too old or sick to capture wild animals. Tigers are good swimmers and enjoy bathing, especially in hot weather, which appears to make them quite uncomfortable. They are poor climbers, taking to trees only in emergencies.

The tiger is an endangered species. Trophy hunting of tigers was a common "sport" in the past, especially during the time of the Raj in India, when tens of thousands of Bengal tigers were shot. The greatest threats to the tiger now, however, are loss of natural habitat, loss of prey species such as deer and wild cattle to hunting by humans, and poaching. Tiger bone is used in traditional Chinese medicines to treat a variety of ailments, including rheumatism and impotence, and its sale and use continue despite a ban imposed by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) in 1976.

Three tiger subspecies, the Caspian, Javan, and Balinese tigers, are extinct; the South China tiger is very near extinction. According to 1995 population estimates, the Bengal tiger is believed to be the most numerous, with an estimated surviving population of 4,000. It is followed by the Indochinese tiger (1,100), the Sumatran tiger (400), and the Siberian tiger (250). Some population rebounds have been noted since then, however, in eastern Siberia, Nepal, and some parts of India owing to increased conservation efforts, but more recently the Bengal tiger population in India has suffered from serious poaching for the Chinese medicinal and animal skin markets. Captive breeding programs for tigers have met with considerable success but are plagued by a lack of space and the problem of maintaining genetic purity between subspecies that are defined more by range than by biological differences.

Tigers are classified in the phylum Chordata, subphylum Vertebrata, class Mammalia, order Carnivora, family Felidae.

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tiger

Reddish tan, striped great cat (Panthera tigris) of forests, grasslands, and swamps in eastern Russia, South Asia, Sumatra, and a few small parts of China. Tigers are solitary, nocturnal hunters, preying on medium-sized mammals (e.g., deer). Locality and subspecies determine size, colour, and stripes. Southern tigers, such as the Bengal tiger (P. tigris tigris), are smaller and more brightly coloured than northern ones, such as the rare Siberian tiger (P. tigris altaica). Males grow to more than 3 ft (1 m) high and 7 ft (2.2 m) long, excluding the 3-ft (1-m) tail, and may weigh 350–640 lb (160–290 kg). Tigers live about 11 years. The persistent use of tiger parts as tonics or medicines, despite evidence refuting their efficacy, is rooted in the awe that the cat has inspired for millennia. Although internationally protected, tigers are seriously endangered; their populations shrank by more than 90% in the last century, and three subspecies are now extinct.

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Tiger

(1) Version 10.4 of the Mac OS X operating system. Introduced in 2005, Tiger includes the Spotlight desktop search and RSS syndication support for the Safari Web browser. It also introduced Dashboard, a launching pad for mini applications known as "widgets" for functions such as weather, dictionary and address book. Dashboard became so popular, it spawned more than a thousand widget apps. See Mac OS X and Mac Dashboard.

(2) An earlier code name for Multimedia Server from Microsoft, which provided multimedia video-on-demand for Windows NT.

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tiger

1. a large feline mammal, Panthera tigris, of forests in most of Asia, having a tawny yellow coat with black stripes

2. any of various other animals, such as the jaguar, leopard, and thylacine

3. 

a. a country, esp in E Asia, that is achieving rapid economic growth

b. (as modifier): a tiger economy

4. Archaic a servant in livery, esp a page or groom

5. short for tiger moth

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tiger [′tī·gər]

(vertebrate zoology)

Felis tigris.An Asiatic carnivorous mammal in the family Felidae characterized by a tawny coat with transverse black stripes and white underparts.

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tiger

aims at annihilating mankind. [Animal Symbolism: Mercatante, 55]

See : Savagery

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Tiger

(Panthera tigris), a mammal of the family Felidae. The tiger, one of the largest of recent predators, measures approximately 3 m in length and has a tail 1.1 m in length; its height at the shoulder is approximately 1.2 m. The tiger has powerful neck and paw muscles and short ears and whiskers. The coat is short and smooth in southern varieties and fluffy in northern ones. The background color of the back and sides is reddish, and of the throat and underparts, white; the body is covered with narrow black transverse stripes.

There are approximately seven geographic varieties of the tiger, found mainly in Southeast Asia, Pakistan, India, Indochina, and the Malay Archipelago. At one time tigers inhabited Transcaucasia and Middle Asia. Approximately 100 individuals now inhabit Primor’e Krai. The world population of tigers living in the wild, as high as 30,000 in the 1930’s, fell to approximately 2,500 by the 1960’s. The tiger is under international protection and is listed in the Red Data Book of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources. In the early 1970’s, 12 tiger sanctuaries were established in India.

The tiger inhabits shrubs and thickets of reeds and bamboo, as well as mountain forests. It avoids very snowy regions but tolerates frosts well. It feeds chiefly on wild ungulates and occasionally attacks domestic livestock, dogs, and bears. Tigers attack human beings only very rarely; man-eaters are usually old or sick animals that are incapable of hunting ungulates. The tiger overtakes its prey with a mighty leap. It pursues the prey no more than 100–150 m when it fails to catch it on the first attempt.

A tigress reproduces once in two or three years and gives birth to two to four and, rarely, six young. The average gestation period is 105 days. Tigers build dens in clefts of rocks, caves, shrubs, and reed thickets. The life-span is usually 20 years or more. Tigers are primarily nocturnal animals of great strength, dexterity, and stamina. Their usual means of locomotion is walking; however, they are good swimmers. Only young tigers climb trees. Tigers can jump as much as 7 m in length and 2 m in height. The life of the tiger is sedentary if food is abundant.

Fossil tigers have been found in Pliocene and Pleistocene deposits in China and Primor’e Krai, USSR. Tigers were once prized by sportsmen and commercial hunters for their splendid fur. Tigers are caught live for zoos; they reproduce in captivity.

REFERENCES

Baikov, N. A. Man’chzhurskii tigr. Harbin, 1925.
Kaplanov, L. G. Tigr, iziubr’, los’. Moscow, 1948.
Mlekopitaiushchie Sovetskogo Soiuza, vol. 2, part 2. Edited by V. G. Geptner and N. P. Naumov. Moscow, 1972.

N. K. VERESHCHAGIN