Bengal Tiger
The Bengal tiger is the tiger of the Indian subcontinent — India, Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan — and the most numerous of the surviving subspecies, accounting for well over half of all wild tigers. Next to the Amur it is a warm-climate animal: a shorter, sleeker coat, a deeper orange ground colour, and bolder, more closely spaced stripes.
Our Bengal is white. A white tiger is not an albino and not a separate subspecies — it is an ordinary Bengal carrying a recessive gene that shuts down the orange pigment in its coat, leaving chocolate or charcoal stripes on cream and, usually, blue eyes. Both parents have to carry the gene, which is why the colouring is vanishingly rare in the wild and why nearly every white tiger alive is in human care.
Plumpton Park Zoo keeps two tigers of two different subspecies: this white Bengal, and a Siberian tiger. Seeing the two within a few minutes of each other is the easiest way to understand how far apart they are — plan your visit today.
DIET
Bengal tigers hunt large hoofed mammals — chital and sambar deer, wild boar, gaur and nilgai — and can eat a great deal in one sitting, then go days without another kill.
FAST FACTS
Weight: Males 400 – 570 lbs; females 220 – 350 lbs
Lifespan: 8 – 10 years in the wild, up to about 20 in human care