Our Pride Royal Bengal Tiger
You’ve heard the glorious name of our national animal Royal Bengal Tiger. It’s found in Sundarbans, the biggest mangrove forest.
The Bengal tiger is a tiger from a specific population of the Panthera tigris tigris subspecies that is native to the Indian subcontinent.It is threatened by poaching, loss, and fragmentation of habitat, and was estimated at comprising fewer than 2,500 individuals by 2011. None of the Tiger Conservation Landscapes within its range is considered large enough to support an effective population of more than 250 adult individuals. India’s tiger population was estimated at 1,706–1,909 individuals in 2010. By 2018, the population had increased to an estimated 2,603–3,346 individuals.Around 300–500 tigers are estimated in Bangladesh, 220–274 tigers in Nepal and 103 tigers in Bhutan.
The tiger is estimated to be present in the Indian subcontinent since the Late Pleistocene, for about 12,000 to 16,500 years.
The Bengal tiger ranks among the biggest wild cats alive today. It is considered to belong to the world’s charismatic megafauna. It is the national animal of both India and Bangladesh. It used to be called Royal Bengal tiger.
The Bengal tiger’s coat is yellow to light orange, with stripes ranging from dark brown to black; the belly and the interior parts of the limbs are white, and the tail is orange with black rings. The white tiger is a recessive mutant of the tiger, which is reported in the wild from time to time in Assam, Bengal, Bihar, and especially from the former State of Rewa. However, it is not to be mistaken as an occurrence of albinism. In fact, there is only one fully authenticated case of a true albino tiger, and none of black tigers, with the possible exception of one dead specimen examined in Chittagong in 1846.
Bengal tigers weigh up to 325 kg (717 lb), and reach a head and body length of 320 cm (130 in). Several scientists indicated that adult male Bengal tigers from the Terai in Nepal and Bhutan, and Assam, Uttarakhand and West Bengal in north India consistently attain more than 227 kg (500 lb) of body weight. Seven adult males captured in Chitwan National Park in the early 1970s had an average weight of 235 kg (518 lb). Males have an average total length of 270 to 310 cm (110 to 120 in) including the tail, while females measure 240 to 265 cm (94 to 104 in) on average. The tail is typically 85 to 110 cm (33 to 43 in) long, and on average, tigers are 90 to 110 cm (35 to 43 in) in height at the shoulders.
Tigers in Bangladesh are now relegated to the forests of the Sundarbans and the Chittagong Hill Tracts. The Chittagong forest is contiguous with tiger habitat in India and Myanmar, but the tiger population is of unknown status.
As of 2004, population estimates in Bangladesh ranged from 200 to 419 individuals, most of them in the Sundarbans. This region is the only mangrove habitat in this bioregion, where tigers survive, swimming between islands in the delta to hunt prey. Bangladesh’s Forest Department is raising mangrove plantations supplying forage for spotted deer. Since 2001, afforestation has continued on a small scale in newly accreted lands and islands of the Sundarbans.
By 2009, the tiger population in the Bangladesh Sundarbans was estimated as 100–150 adult females or 335–500 tigers overall. Female home ranges, recorded using Global Positioning System collars, were some of the smallest recorded for tigers, indicating that the Bangladesh Sundarbans could have one of the highest densities and largest populations of tigers anywhere in the world.
The tigers living in the Sundarbans are threatened by habitat destruction, prey depletion, highly aggressive and rampant intraspecific competition, tiger-human conflict, and direct tiger loss. By 2017, this population was estimated at 84–158 individuals. A rising sea-level due to climate change is projected to cause a severe loss of suitable habitat for this population in the following decades, around 50% by 2050 and 100% by 2070.
Royal Begal Tiger plays an vital role to introduce our nation to the whole world.