Popular Official Guide to the New York Zoological Park (September 1915): Thirteenth EditionHornaday, William T. (William Temple)
History
Popular Official Guide to the New York Zoological Park (September 1915): Thirteenth Edition
Hornaday, William T. (William Temple)
New York Zoological Park
In captivity, the Lion is reasonably contented, and under good
conditions breeds readily, and lives a goodly number of years.
The Siberian Tiger.—Strange to say, the tiger ranges far to the
northward of its proper home in Hindustan, even to Corea, Manchuria and
Russian Siberia. In those cold regions the tiger grows to its greatest
size, and is clothed with a dense coat of long and shaggy hair. In
collections, the great northern tigers are the most highly prized. The
Zoological Park has recently acquired from East Siberia two fine young
specimens, born early in 1909, and all the year round they inhabit the
great northern outdoor cage attached to the Lion House. It is a strange
sight to see tigers living outdoors in winter in New York.
[Illustration: SNOW LEOPARD.]
The Tiger will be found upon the earth long after the lion has
disappeared. He is a far better hider, a more skillful hunter, less
given to taking foolish risks, and he does not advertise his presence
and invite his enemies by the bombastic roaring in which the lion
delights to indulge. The Tiger is an animal of serious mind, and he
attends strictly to business. A lion will stalk out into the open, in
broad day, but the Tiger sticks closely to cover until the friendly
darkness renders it safe to roam abroad.
Despite the density of the population of India, and the omnipresence of
sahibs with rifles of large caliber, the Tiger still inhabits all India
from Cape Comorin to the Himalayas, the Malay Peninsula, Sumatra, Burma,
Siam, and certain portions of China up to the region of snows. Corean
and Siberian Tigers are much sought after by zoological gardens, partly
on account of their size, and also because they are so hardy they are
able to live out doors all winter in the temperate zone. The Tiger is
not found in Africa, nor in any country westward of India.
The maximum length attained by this animal, head, body and tail, is 10
feet 2 inches. A very large specimen killed by Dr. Hornaday measured 9
feet 8½ inches in length, stood 3 feet 7 inches high at the shoulders,
and weighed, on the scales, 495 pounds. In India, Tigers are classed
according to their habits, as “game-killers,” “cattle-lifters,” or
“man-eaters.” Fortunately, in comparison with the total number of these
animals, the latter are few and far between.
Of yellow-coated felines, The Jaguar, (_Felis onca_), is next in size to
the tiger. In South America, it is almost universally called “El Tigre”
(pronounced Te’-gre), which is Spanish for tiger. Comparatively few
Americans are aware that this superb animal belongs in the fauna of the
United States, but such is the fact. The northern limit of its
distribution is found in southern Texas, where it still exists in small
numbers. In South America it extends to Patagonia.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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