FAVORITE WILD ANIMAL

[Undertow]

I love animals. It's hard to decide on a favorite - I think they're all fascinating. I really like lemurs and tigers. I could start listing animals out but I better stop there.

 

[scottyrocks]

In addition to my frogs, I also think that owls are cool, particularly horned. I also like rays, as in manta and sting.

 

[Miss Golightly]

Wolves - fascinating creatures.....

 

[rue]

My favorite animal has always been the Bear, especially the Grizzly bear also known as the 'silvertip bear' or the 'North American brown bear'.......

The big cutie is also on my home state flag,

but that's not the reason I love them so much

 

[Feraud]

In addition to my frogs, I also think that owls are cool, particularly horned. I also like rays, as in manta and sting.

I have a very fond memory of visting the aquarium in Mystic, CT and visting their ray pool. The cownose rays were curious and friendly. Some of them seemed to intentionally swim towards your hand for a rub. Amazing!

 

[AmateisGal]

Tigers!

My daughter has been fascinated with them for years and it is her goal to help save them when she grows up. She is 10 now, so I hope that they will still be in the wild by the time she's an adult. But it's frightening just how fast they are disappearing.

She had the good fortune to actually hold a baby tiger a few years ago.

 

[Undertow]

Tigers!

My daughter has been fascinated with them for years and it is her goal to help save them when she grows up. She is 10 now, so I hope that they will still be in the wild by the time she's an adult. But it's frightening just how fast they are disappearing.

She had the good fortune to actually hold a baby tiger a few years ago.

Wow, that is adorable!

 

[DanielJones]

Snow leopards.

Cheers!

Dan

 

[Femme Fatale]

Koalas make me feel all warm and fuzzy on the inside.

 

[Yeps]

Any of the big cats.

 

[Wire9Vintage]

Would you believe I met a vulture that stole my heart?? We were visiting an animal rescue place, and a few years ago,they had rescued a little vulture chick and raised it. She is free to fly anywhere she wants, and they think she's even raised chicks out there somewhere, too, but she got attached to one of the workers and always comes to visit. The vulture went for a walk with us through the ranch. It was utterly amazing!

But I'm all about the wild birds in general.

 

[The Lonely Navigator]

Scottyrocks: I also like rays, as in manta and sting.

I think they're neat as well. I actually like all sea creatures - but am close to the shark as it is my totem animal.

 

[scottyrocks]

Part of my given religious name translates to 'bear,' but I dont feel especially close to it.

 

[CharlieB]

Also the other tiger subspecies - seeing the Sumatran Tiger in the Zoo was a great event for me.

Have to agree. Tiger is my favorite. Has been since I was a kid. I was especially happy the first time I went to a Chinese restaraunt and found I was born in a year of the tiger.

My friend an co-worker from Vietnam brought me back a small wood carving of a tiger, which I treasure greatly.

 

[randooch]

Coyotes, most definitely: maligned, reviled, mercilessly killed, but nonetheless clever, resilient, and beautiful.

 

[HungaryTom]

I was born in 1972 (year of the rat) Still I adore tigers. Ditto since my childhood.

For all loungers interested in tigers:

Information about the Caspian tiger: http://tigrovajabalka.tj/english/20-turan-tiger.html - This was one of this subspecies' last strongholds. Here they transgressed from neighboring North-Afghanistan to Tajikistan back and forth until they were killed off on both sides.

Similar is said on their habitat in Caucasus - tigers were permanent, but later they just migrated from the Elburz mountains of Iran and from the Kurd mountains of South-East Turkey into Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan and vice versa. In the 18th and 19th they still went further north up to the Caucasian regions near the Black Sea coast. But tigers wandered also to the south - one tiger was shot near Mosul/Iraq in 1887.

During the 10-12th centuries, when the steppes had herds of European bison, wild horses and saiga antelopes, they also occurred on the Ciscaucasian plains of South Russia. Russian literature of the Middle Age suggests that vagrant Caspian tigers even reached Ukraine (Chernigov principality) and confronted with some Russian princes - Vladimir Monomakh II. http://houseostrov.org/a+r/peotr/ostrovwild.html

„and another wild beast jumped on my flank and threw my horse with me”. Bears, wolves are listed explicitly in the poem, so it must have been another animal, which he didn't knew. Check this out : http://youtu.be/NQy-FQtKoGo
This video tells all why the tiger is feared and respected...

The tigers problem in Central Asia were:
-Limited core habitats linked to deer species and wild boar - reed thickets in river oases and the shores of inland drainage lakes and foothill forests. Local patches and stripes of habitats few kilometers wide ("islands") here and there locked in between waterless semi-deserts and full deserts and highest mountains.
-Since prey was never as plentiful as in the savannas and monsoon forests of India or South East Asia, tigers had to migrate, even on open places alien to them, exposing them more.
- Their limited range i.e.the few watercourses and rivers were the corridors for colonization and transporting like Ohio and Mississippi valleys were in North America, plus the cultivation with cotton fragmented their areas.
- Direct hunting - Organized hunting parties, naturalists have observed dozens of pelts at military officers, tigers were considered pests. Hunting was banned officially in 1947 in the Soviet Union but it never stopped till the last specimen was shot.
- Caspian tigers became plentiful after large wars in the 13th century Mongolean killings and also in the 18th century. However they spent their last 200 years with playing a macabre hide and seek vs. humans: they were migrating back and forth in their huge range in Central Asia trying to escape human pressure.

Bali is merely 5634 square kilometers - this meant max. 120-130 adults at one point of time, counting the lowest possible range of 40 km2/tiger. Small range and few prey made Balinese tigers very small. The same happens nowadays to the Royal Bengal tigers of the Sunderbans - they are malnourished and grow Bali-tiger size; 76-100 kilos vs. 138 kilos average of other tigers in India.
http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-12-experts-link-stress-bengal-tigers.html

Java is 132187 square kilometers but it got insanely overpopulated in the 20th century - tigers don't have any place there anymore.

Check out Google books:
Mammals of the Soviet union vol 2. Carnivores keywords: Caspian tiger, Turanian tiger.
John Seidensticker et al.: Riding the tiger: tiger conservation in human-dominated landscapes

Cats stray - Amur/Caspian tigers are/were the biggest cats - so they are/were recorders in straying. They showed up thousands of kilometers outside their normal range. Most probably they went because of hunger, seeking opportunities. Amur tigers were observed in the 18th and 19th century in Central and Eastern Siberia. Hence the name Siberian tiger. They intruded Sakhalin island crossing the Tartary strait (Mamiya Strait) being only 7,3 km on the narrowest point.

During the Ice age smaller tigers inhabited also other Islands of Japan but disappeared - killed off by humans. Tigers tried their luck also in America - they went over to Beringia, but were out-powered by predators such as sabretooth Smilodons and the American lions hunting in groups.

What is really frightening how all wild tigers as apex predators are melting off everywhere in mainland Asia with IDEAL tiger habitats, formerly huge and continuous forest coverage, abundant water, prey etc. - this shows how their habitat degrades throughout Asia - over 4 billion people pressuring the environment. Saving tigers is now about saving the environment and saving us humans ultimately from extinction.

A- †Bali tiger B - †Caspian tiger/Afghanistan
C - Bengal tiger/India D - †Java tiger
E - Indochinese/Vietnam F - Sumatra tiger

 

[MikeBravo]

I love the aardvark. Mainly because they're always listed first in the Yellow Pages

 

[scottyrocks]

'Does anybody here have an aardvark?
Does anybody here have an aardvark?
Everyone here has a right and left ear,
But nobody here has an aardvark!'

 

[CharlieB]

Thanks, HungaryTom. That reminds me of when I had to read Marco Polo's accounts of his travels for a college history course. He called them "Red Lions".

 

[CharlieB]

I love the aardvark. Mainly because they're always listed first in the Yellow Pages

Yeah, we have a local computer company here named Aardvark for that very reason.