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COUNTRY NOTEBOOK: M.Krishnan : Tiger, tiger, not burning bright :The Sunday Statesman:1 September 2019
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" THE TIGER, according to the experts, does not burn bright in the forests of night, and even by day its orange-ochre and white pelage boldly striped with black is obliterative serving to break up contour and merge with the streaky grass and bushes. In assessing the cryptic patterning of the tiger's coat two things should be remembered. First, most of the animals it preys on (deer, pig, cattle and the like) are colour blind so far as we know and can see things only in terms of black grey and white, somewhat like panchromatic film. Second at night when light levels are low and the tiger usually hunts even our colour sensitive eyes cannot readily distinguish between colours.

I have had considerable difficulty in spotting a leopard in the under-shrub and even been totally unable to make it out from near, but not a tiger. No doubt that is because of the tigers much larger size. But even when in heavy cover when it is only glimpsed through intervening foliage and twigs the tigers face has certain conspicuous features the circles of white around the eyes (the "sunspots") marked with black bars and spots the white whiskers framing the face and the white chin (closely spotted with black only near the mouth) its mask gives away the tiger when it looks up at one from cover. However when hunting or hiding it seldom looks up. It keeps its head lowered as if it knows in some dim instinctive way that by lowering its head its chin would no longer be visible,and that even its whiskers and "sunspots" would be less noticeable in the fore-shortened view. The white underside of the body and the white insides of the limbs heavily striped with black, are naturally not seen when the animal is in cover or crouching.

The other greater cats have no harlequin masks. The lion and the puma, the leopard and the jaguar, have less conspicuously white chins and whiskers and hardly any "sunspots". But if you wish to know how truly obliterative a tiger's seemingly vivid colouring is you have only to go to one of these modern zoos where they have a large open air enclosure, planted with tall grass and bushes and insulated by a deep moat into which they let out lions and tigers (sometime by turns). You will then see that in cover the seemingly dull, whole coloured tawny coat of the lion is much more readily seen than the striped coat of the tiger.

Another conspicuous feature of the tiger's pelage is the light coloured spots, almost white, at the back of each ear heavily rimmed with black. Many other animals of the cat family also have such ear-spots, but in none of them are they as flagrant as in the tiger. Even in the tiger, it is only when the animal is seen from behind or partly from behind, that the ear spots are so conspicuous. Why should there be any need for a tiger to be visible from behind?

The theory has been advanced that in the cats, the ear spots serve a function in aggressive displays, that the ears are turned around so far that their backs become visible from the front when the animal is threatening a possible adversary. With specific reference to the tiger, this theory may be discounted. At no time have I seen a wild or captive tiger (and some of the fresh-caught ones I have seen have been singularly savage and prone to aggressive displays) turn its ear round in this manner.

It is not necessary any longer in modern scientific natural history, to prove a function or to attribute a specific function for every morphological peculiarity noticed.

It could be that the remarkably flagrant ear spots of the tiger serve no purpose, but probably they do serve an important purpose, in enabling other tigers to follow a leading tiger when no communication by voice or displayed attitude is possible."

- M. Krishnan

# This was published on 16 May 1971.
@ The photograph of a tiger cub in the forest with white spots at the back of the ears has not been reproduced here.