STRIPELESS TIGER MAY HELP SOLVE 99 YEAR OLD MYSTERY

Fareeda - a white tiger cub at a South African animal park - has been born without stripes. This is mildly interesting in itself, but we would like to refer you to one of the major articles in this issue of Animals & Men

which tells the story of a mystery cat shot in Hong Kong in 1910.


The original reference in the South China Morning Post reads:


“Residents in Kowloon ought in future to rest peacefully at night, for the prowling “tiger” has at last been killed. This was the news which reached our office last night.

It appears that on Saturday afternoon several parties set out into the New Territory with the avowed intention of bringing home the skin of the “tiger” if there was such an animal anywhere in the reach of a gun.


One of these parties consisting of 6 men, set out late on Saturday afternoon. From information they obtained from outlining villages, they learned that the beast was in the habit of feeding in the neighbourhood of Tai Om between 4 and 5 in the morning. The hunters accordingly concealed themselves near the place and waited with commendable patience. They were rewarded for their long wait, for at half past four on Sunday morning it made its appearance. Two shots were fired at it, one striking it in the neck and the other in the back. Both shots took effect, one of the bullets entering the spine, and the beast at once collapsed and in a very short time was dead.


In its death struggles the animal dug a hole in the ground nearly 3 feet deep. It was a powerful beast and measured 5feet 1inch in length without the tail. It stood about 3 feet high. Its skin was of a dark brown hue, and it did not resemble a tiger. It is thought to belong to the panther specie. [sic]

The two successful shots were fired by Sergt. Devny and Mr. Gast. They are to be congratulated on the success of their hunting expedition, and they will have the satisfaction of having relieved the minds of the residents in the outlying villages of the New Territory. They left the animal in the New Territory, we understand, for the purpose of having the skin preserved. What will be done with it afterwards has not been decided. It will make an interesting addition to the local museum”.

In the article written by Jon and Richard Muirhead, this and other mystery cats from the region are discussed, and it is hypothesised that they might be stripeless tigers. Now, Fareeda has proved that this might well be the case....

Read the original article

WHITE TIGER/CHIMP INTERACTION

When I was a boy white tigers were exceptionally rare. Indeed, from memory, I remember reading something claiming that the only ones in the world were at Bristol Zoo, to which they had been presented by the Maharajah of somewhere or other in the 1920s.

Now they seem to be everywhere.

Either my Boy's Book of Knowledge, that my Auntie Phyllis gave me for a birthday present in about 1966, mislead me or Siegfried and Roy teamed up with the fugitive Josef Mengele somewhere in Bolivia in the 1970s and carried out a series of Boys from Brazil-type big cat breeding experiments. Or possibly there is a third explanation.

However, that is not what I wanted to write about. Beth from Hartland Wildlife Rescue recently sent me a series of pictures (from which I have extracted these five) of some ridiculously cute Chimpanzee/ White tiger cub interaction.

Having lived with Richard Freeman for the best part of a decade, and known him even longer, I have always been conditioned by him to think of chimps as mean, vicious killing machines, the "pilled up hobo with a hammer" of the higher primates. But surprisingly Richard confirmed that such interactions are not uncommon.

He writes:

The public's view of the common chimpanzee as a cute, cuddly, mischevious little scamp is one of the most egregiously wrong assesments of any animal. Around eight times stronger than a man, armed with savage teeth, and a demented hatred of almost everything and everyone, the chimp is one of the most dangerous and unpredictable animals on earth.

I have worked with over 400 different species of animal and the chimp is the one I trust the least, and one of the very few for which I have an have an active dislike. Some animals will kill you for food or if they think you are a threat. Chimps will kill out of sheer malice and bloodlust. One of a chimp's favourate tricks is to tear a man's testicles off when attacking him.

How odd it was, then, when I found out years ago, that chimps like cats and dogs. Back in my days as a keeper at Twycross Zoo (home of the now huge and vicious PG Tips chimps) I was told by keeper Betty Walsh that chimps love to play with dogs and cats, and are quite gentle with them.

I have seen several film sequences of this occuring and the normally brutal chimps being as gentle as lambs.