Could Siberian Tigers Survive In Antarctica?
With its immense size and powerful body, the Siberian tiger prowls the dense forest of eastern Asia in search of prey.
It has been carefully suited for the cold climate in which it lives. It’s a cunning predator capable of dispatching practically any other animal, regardless of size.
But because of the value placed on its luxurious fur and the supposed medicinal purposes of its parts, the animal is under constant, threat of extinction from human activity.
To maintain present population levels, careful conservation measures and local government protection will be required.
The Siberian tiger is the largest cat in the world averages about 3.3 meters or 11 feet in length with a tail measuring 1 meter or 3 feet in adult males.
Siberian tigers can weigh up to 320 kilograms or 700 pounds while females are significantly smaller weighing up to 180 kilograms or 400 pounds.
They have a thick layer coat of fur that consists primarily of pale orange color combinations around the head, legs, and back, with additional white colorations around the eye regions, snout, cheeks, and inner legs.
Characteristics
The Siberian tiger’s most distinguishing characteristic is the tiny black stripes that run across its head and body. Why do tigers have stripes
camouflage and stealth in the forests, however, it has relatively fewer stripes compared to other tiger subspecies other distinguishing characteristics of the Siberian tigers include thick paws, short pointed ears.
Its tail is tube-shaped in appearance, having black and white stripes, head and snout seem flattened, and a big muscular torso.
Their hind legs are long and more steady than the front ones making the tiger a great jumper, able to climb trees, swim effectively, and catch prey.
Their formidable claws and teeth let them latch on to their prey and prevent it from fleeing.
Tigers speak to each other via their sense of smell and strange vocals, whiskers enable them to navigate narrow paths at night.
However, like many other failed species, Siberian tigers lack a complex social structure, they are largely solitary creatures that aggressively police their territories through either claw marks on trees or scent marks sprayed with urine and secretions.
This tells tigers to be wary of intruding on an individual’s current hunting grounds despite their fierce territorial aggression. Lioness vs Tigress – Who is the queen of the jungle?
Distribution and habitat
These tigers are fairly migratory creatures that have been known to traverse hundreds of miles in search of homes and mating opportunities at a time.
Young adult males, especially, may roam around a lot before settling down in a more permanent territory, and male and female territories sometimes overlap for mating reasons.
The Siberian tiger originally roamed a broad expanse of the area spanning modern-day Russia, northeastern China, and the Korean peninsula, but the subspecies are now extinct due to population reduction.
Restricted to a narrow range around the Allen mountain range near the pacific coast of Russia.
Their territory goes far a little into North Korea and China regions. These tigers tend to prefer the dense mixed forest around the region.
They are carnivores and apex predators feeding on varieties of animals.
Its diet consists primarily of large ungulate prey meaning hoofed animals such as deer and wild boar other potential prey includes rabbits salmon and even on rare occasions bears.
In regions where tigers and humans coexist, tigers feed on cattle at night
Tigers are silent and sneaky predators who will creep up on prey behind the cover of trees to attack and kill them almost swiftly, with a powerful bite to the neck. Are Beagles Smart?
Ecology and behavior
Tigers can run at speeds of around 30 to 40 miles per hour for short periods to chase prey.
Few ambushes will actually result in a successful kill so the tiger must be consistently vigilant for good hunting opportunities.
He eats a lot in one sitting, up to 60 pounds of a meal can be consumed, they can also survive if there’s insufficient food to satisfy their hunger.
The tiger does not usually eat every part of the deceased prey leaving behind parts of the carcass for other animals. 10 Biggest Rivalries in the Animal kingdom
Siberian tigers avoid human settlements, a few, however, have killed humans.
Siberian tigers are extremely strong animals and have amazing qualities.
But can they cope in Antarctica?
Antarctica is very different than Siberia except for the cold of course. Antarctica is a desert that lacks vegetation and tall trees.
Animals that spend time in Antarctica are semi-aquatic and use the continent as a temporary resting or breeding area.
The cold prevents plant life, even more, problematic is the scarcity of water.
Antarctica is a vast frozen dessert, very different from the northern polar regions
Even though the tiger has plenty of food and fresh water it wouldn’t survive
There are no cat species, in the polar regions of the north because of a lack of food supply.
Why Siberian Tiger cannot survive in Antarctica
Cat species aren’t adapted to cope with the harsh conditions, if they were, they would have most likely have moved there.
Historically, the tundra biome is slightly more hospitable than the polar biomes so as far as adaptations.
Siberian tigers lack the six-inch layer of fat that polar bears have which helps insulate them from the cold. Could Siberian tigers simply evolve?
Adaptations don’t come about as-needed basis but are purely random and to produce this layer of fat other
necessary physiological changes would need to occur which without prior genotype information available would be extremely unlikely to occur.
You might ask what about the sensible adaptation of white fur? Again does the gene for white fur exist?
in the genotype of the Siberian tiger, possibly. So will the tiger change to a pure white coloration? possibly, though again we find it unlikely as no truly white tigers have been documented.
The tiger’s tail would be a disadvantage because it increases heat loss. Is the tiger’s tail going to fall off? Bengal Tiger (Interesting Fact Explained)
But once again it would only occur based on complete randomness. If the gene does not exist for taillessness and tigers then would not appear
in conclusion:
Siberian tigers do not exist in polar regions because they’re simply not adapted to them and even placing a tiger in a polar region with sufficient food would not allow it to survive.
