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The Thinking Tiger

@krishbohra.bsky.social

61 followers 29 following 240 posts

Wildlife enthusiast🐅 History nerd🔍 Bibliophile 📚 I like chasing animals in history 🐾 ✍️ You may or may not know me from Twitter.

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The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · Mar 3

Happy World Wildlife Day!!
Once upon a time, lions were found in half of North India. Now they live in Gir alone. Knowing their history in 19th century helps us understand this decline. You can read my article here! 🦁🦁🦁
medium.com/@krish_bohra...

Dwindling Prides and Fading Roars: Indian Lion in the 19th Century

A brief look into the history of lions in 19th century India

medium.com

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 2h

Source: Journal of Bombay Natural History Society vol. 40 (1938)

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 2h

Day 74/100 of Cool Indian Wildlife History

C. Howson of the Mayo College, Ajmer in 1938 wrote about families of otters killing crocodiles in the Pushkar Lake. He goes on to say that when he shared this with students, one of them shared a similar incident from Bundi.

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The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 1d

Source: Narrative of a Journey Through the Upper Provinces of India from Calcutta to Bombay, 1824-1825 vol. 1 by Reginald Heber (1828)

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 1d

Context: Barrackpore Menagerie was a large collection of animals built by Richard Wellesley and later maintained by the Company. It is considered a precursor to the Alipore Zoo of Kolkata, India's first Public Zoo, opened in 1876, after which Barrackpore didn't have any animals.

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 1d

Day 73/100 of Cool Indian Wildlife History

Reginald Heber, second Bishop of Calcutta, came to what is now a locality of Kolkata, Chitpur, on 1 March, 1824. Here, he saw a jackal. He also mentions Baboo Budinâth Roy, who lived there had a “menagerie . . . only inferior to that of Barrackpoor.”

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 2d

Source: Journal of Bombay Natural History Society vol. 30 (1925)

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 2d

Day 72/100 of Cool Indian Wildlife History

This note on an alleged blackbuck-chinkara shot in Bikaner was published in 1925. Though it is hard to say for certain what the animal was with such scarce details, the text and the accompanying photograph make it a rather curious record.

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The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 3d

Source: Journal of Bombay Natural History Society, vol. 4 (1889)

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 3d

Day 71/100 of Cool Indian Wildlife History

Similipal's pseudomelanistic tigers are famous for their larger than usual black stripes today. But what's not generally known is this old record of a completely black tiger shot in Chittagong in 1846. It is the only known record of its kind.

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The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 3d

This postcard has been on my mind ever since I saw it for the first time exactly because of how the tiger looks. It is also unique because it has a live animal as opposed to the norm of hunting scenes and trophies. Would love to research it more deeply someday.

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 3d

We're one month away from finishing this . . .

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 4d

Day 70/100 of Cool Indian Wildlife History

This postcard was made by the Gobindram & Oodeyram studio in 1908. Based in Jaipur, they specialized in photos related to the city. The tiger is in a captive setting, and given the studio, it is highly likely it was originally from the jungles of Jaipur.

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 4d

Source: www.paperjewels.org/postcard/tig...

Tiger, Jaipur

Most postcards of tigers during this period were of ones killed during hunting expeditions. with this being a refreshing exception even as the animal is likely confined in a small space.

www.paperjewels.org

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 4d

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The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 5d

Source: Journal of Bombay Natural History Society vol. 42 (1942)

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 5d

Day 69/100 of Cool Indian Wildlife History

Van Ingen and Van Ingen was a famous taxidermy firm in British India that served a large number of hunters and naturalists across the country. In 1941, they published two photos of unusual morphs in two tigers and a leopard with a note on their origins.

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The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 6d

Source: Oriental Field Sports; Being a Complete, Detailed and Accurate Description of the Wild sports of the East by Thomas Williamson (1807)

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 6d

Day 68/100 of Cool Indian Wildlife History

A lot of British hunters and tribal peoples in India believed in large packs of dholes killing tigers but its written accounts have questionable reliability. This is its only known visual depiction.

Tiger Hunted by Wild Dogs, Samuel Howitt (1807)

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The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 7d

Source: www.cambridge.org/core/journal...

The status of the Sumatran rhinoceros in north-eastern India | Oryx | Cambridge Core

The status of the Sumatran rhinoceros in north-eastern India - Volume 31 Issue 2

www.cambridge.org

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 7d

Day 66/100 of Cool Indian Wildlife History

Sumatran rhinos were generally considered to have gone extinct in India by mid-20th century. In 1996, Dr. Anwaruddin Choudhury went for research in the far-northeast of India along the border with Myanmar and discovered local reports from the region.

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The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 8d

Source: www.rhinoresourcecenter.com/index.php?s=...

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 8d

Day 64/100 of Cool Indian Wildlife History

This is a table from a report made by J. C. Haughton, Commissioner of Cooch Behar, in 1879, showing the animals bounty-hunted in the region from 1867, to 1869.

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The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 9d

Source: Large Game Shooting in Thibet, the Himalayas, Northern and Central India by Captain Alexander Kinloch (1885)

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 9d

Day 63/100 of Cool Indian Wildlife History

Captain A. Kinloch spent 15 yrs in 19th c. India and wrote a book on the wildlife found here. He mentions a soldier during the Revolt of 1857 who shot a captive rhino to test the idea that their skin is impenetrable. The animal died and he was punished.

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 10d

Source: Bullet and Shot in Indian Forest, Plain and Hill: With Hints to Beginners in Indian Shooting by Charles Edward Mackintosh Russell (1900)

The Thinking Tiger @krishbohra.bsky.social · 10d

Day 62/100 of Cool Indian Wildlife History

In 1882, C. E. M. Russell, a young hunter then, was out for gaur in the forests of Berambadi at the edge of current Bandipur National Park, when he saw five cheetahs, one of which he shot dead. One of the southernmost records of an Indian cheetah.

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