How does a Tiger Attack its Prey?

If the Tiger is so well known today, it is as much for its immense power as its reputation as a man-eating animal. Tiger attacks are a testimony to the current conflict between Man and wildlife. Because we want to feel all-powerful, nature sometimes reminds us of our limits in the most brutal way.

The tiger, a wild animal, is one of the most dangerous animals, along with the lion. But the lion attacks from the front, while the tiger tries to attack its victim from behind. To catch its prey, this big cat stalks it slowly and quietly, then ambushes it.

Since tigers are such powerful hunters, they can go in for a kill by ambush. Tigers stalk their intended prey or lie in wait for it to pass by, then pounce when the time is right. Each step of that stalk, from the slow approach to the final leap, is covered in our guide to how a tiger hunts its prey.

This tactic can be used to attack hoofed animals, such as deer and buffalo. Depending on what area of land you’re in and what prey is most abundant, tigers may stalk their prey or lie in wait for it.

Tigers have killed more people than any other big cat. Between 1800 and 2010, an intense study shows that the tiger is responsible for more than 350,000 deaths on earth. These carnages are mainly in Asia and, more particularly in India, the Tiger country. An even more striking figure: one scholar has estimated that tigers killed about 1 million people in Asia over the last four centuries.

In South-East Asia, attacks still happen: in 2024, tigers killed two villagers in Lampung, on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. However, in the Indian region of the Sundarbans, the Tiger has been terrorizing people for more than 30 years. Tiger attacks on humans are formidable, and many are fatal.

Tiger attacks always fascinate as much as they frighten the populations. But why do these attacks take place, and what are the consequences? This article tries to answer both questions.

The reasons for the Tiger attacks

1) Destruction of habitat and prey

 The Tiger is a fantastic animal around which too much misinformation is still circulating. The most important thing to remember is that the big cat never kills without a reason, because humans are not part of its diet. However, when people encroach on its territory, it defends itself with the savage strength it is known for.

Approximately 90 people die each year because of tiger attacks. This number seems paltry compared to the numbers of 100 years ago, but it is still significant. India is most affected by these attacks, especially the Sundarbans region in the east of the country, on the border with Bangladesh. Moreover, it is not uncommon to see the Tigers more aggressive with humans because of poaching.

In this swampy area, the Tigers find themselves on extremely restricted land. Indeed, human infrastructures have pushed to the cohabitation between the Tiger and the Man. This tense situation leads to mass killings among the populations. It is not uncommon to see a tiger enter villages searching for food. The cohabitation between Man and Tiger is impossible because the big cat will never accept sharing its territory.

In addition to living on a small piece of territory, the Bengal Tiger has great difficulty finding food in the Sundarbans. The swamps are not conducive to the proliferation of herbivores, which creates a real problem for the Tiger to feed correctly. If it cannot find game of its own size, it will fall back on smaller prey such as humans.

These attacks of Tigers mark many Indians. There are countless scarred and bruised faces that bear witness to a past bite. For them, to come out of an attack "only" seriously wounded is a chance because many tiger attacks on people are fatal. The destruction of the Tiger's environment and the lack of game pushes it to attack humans. But this destructive behavior can be explained by other factors.

2) Accidental attacks

The first intention of the big cat is not necessarily to kill humans. Generally speaking, tiger attacks are the result of human carelessness. Getting too close to a tiger, or disturbing it while it feeds, tends to make it very angry. This is even more dangerous if it is a Tiger with cubs, as she will be even more aggressive for fear that her cubs will be harmed. This is common sense, but people who don't understand these basic rules are putting themselves at deadly risk.

Other attacks occur because of misidentification by the Tiger. Indeed, when a human crouches, it can easily be mistaken for a sambar or a chital (the Tiger's basic food). A bit like the shark confuses the surfer's board with a turtle; the Tiger confuses the squatting Man with a herbivore.

In addition, to protect yourself from attacks, it is essential not to run or cycle in a place where there are Tigers. Tigers love to chase things in motion, creating real avoidable dramas. For over 20 years, an Indian mailman delivered mail on foot through Tiger territory. He was never attacked or threatened by one of these beasts. One day, he decided to deliver the mail by bicycle to go faster, and a Tiger chased him; he almost died. This shows how important it is not to excite these striped creatures if we want to survive.

Accidents are not uncommon in zoos. Keeping tigers in captivity requires constant attention, and the slightest negligence can be fatal. Many zookeepers have paid the price, as the Tiger remains a wild animal. In 2019, a keeper at the Topeka Zoo in Kansas was attacked by Sanjiv, a male Sumatran tiger, in his outdoor habitat. She was injured on the head, neck and back but survived. The zoo director said the tiger simply reacted the way that is normal for a tiger.

The most unaware are the visitors who do everything possible to get as close as possible to the big cat. Unfortunately for them, the Tiger rarely gives a second chance. Footage of such incidents shows how easily the Tiger can kill a human.

3) Man-eating Tigers

 In some cases, Tigers can change their diet and become real man-eaters. As a rule, the tigers least able to hunt deer are the ones that fall back on humans. It has been observed that "man-eaters" are often old Tigers slowed down by an injury or an illness. Man represents easy prey for them in comparison with their basic food.

Thus, the Tiger would have killed more than 33 000 people in India between 1876 and 1912. Some even attacked elephants to make the people riding them fall off, and then devoured them. Even if these cases are rare, they show us that man-eating tigers are not a legend of Indian folklore.

These repeated attacks also show that some tigers develop a habit of human hunting. There are many accounts by specialists describing Tigers feeding only on human flesh. This is because a tiger succeeds far more often against a human than against herbivores. When a tiger attacks a person, the attack is fatal in about 6 cases out of 10, according to studies in Nepal; with wild prey, its hunting success has been estimated at only 5 to 10% in India. However, it seems that the Tiger does not have a particular preference for human flesh.

During the wars, Tigers made carnages within the troops of soldiers. The big cat was almost more feared than the enemy itself. Some soldiers were killed by tigers, for example during the Vietnam War. Their attacks were discreet but lightning fast.

They usually surprise their victims from behind because it seems that the Tigers do not attack when they are spotted. It is almost impossible to spot the Tiger in the vegetation of the jungles and savannahs. It takes advantage of this to strike in a flash, biting its prey on the neck. With its powerful canines, it kills by biting or breaking the neck.

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 Precautions and measures put in place

1) Giving the Tiger more space

 As you know, the Tiger is a very territorial animal. This means that it will not tolerate the presence of intruders on its land, let alone humans. Many tiger attacks are carried out for the sole purpose of defending their environment. These primal instincts are not about feeding on human flesh but about driving the intruder away.

To prove this, we can give you the example of a Tigress who killed eight people wandering on her territory. She and her cubs did not even feed on the carcasses of the dead, which shows that the family did not need food. The cohabitation between man and Tiger being impossible, the authorities decided to offer more space to the big cat.

These developments have been implemented at the expense of the population; some villages have even been completely moved. The measures put in place seem to be effective because we can see a decrease in the number of Tiger attacks in the regions concerned. But in some cases, this simple arrangement of the territory is not enough, and the state has to take a harder line.

2) More controversial solutions

 It's pretty rare, but it's essential to talk about it; it sometimes happens that Tigers become uncontrollable. They go on a mass killing spree and decimate entire villages. The local populations then set up real hunts for the Tigers to kill the animal responsible for the deaths that ravage their community.

Man-eating tigers are usually wild tigers that can no longer catch their normal prey, most often because of wounds and sometimes because of old age.

Even if the Tiger is a highly protected species, authorities sometimes have no other choice than to shoot them. Indeed, many Tigers were captured after having killed a man but released straight back into the wild. Because the Indian government seemed to put the Tiger before its people, protests grew, so much so that today the authorities have to act firmly if they want to avoid revolts in the villages.

In the best case, the hunt for the Tigers leads to the capture of the man-killer. In the worst case, he is killed on the spot to prevent him from running away. If he is captured, his condition and ability to evolve in captivity will decide his fate. The authorities will determine if he should be killed because he is too dangerous or if he can be raised in a zoo or a reserve.
Other measures have been put in place by the villagers, such as wearing a mask on the back of the head during expeditions within the Tiger's land. According to them, a tiger will not attack if it realizes it has been spotted, hence the usefulness of the masks. This strategy is moderately effective, even if it is true that the tiger always prefers to attack from behind.

More far-fetched techniques have been developed, such as electrifying human dummies so that the Tigers register that they should not attack humans. Another was to release prey such as pigs into the wild so that the Tiger will attack them rather than humans. These two projects proved ineffective and were quickly abandoned.

The three most deadly tigers

1) The Champawat Tiger

The Champawat Tiger was a man-eating Tigress who is said to have killed nearly 200 men and women before being driven out of Nepal. She settled in the Champawat district of the northern Indian state of Uttarakhand. She did not stop there and continued to kill, bringing the total number of her victims to 436. She was finally found and shot in 1907. She is known to have entered villages, even in broad daylight, its roar creating panic and making people flee to their makeshift homes.

2) The Chowgarh Killers

The Chowgarh Tigers were a pair of man-eating Bengal Tigers, consisting of an old Tigress and her cub. Over five years, they killed 64 people in the eastern division of Kumaon, Uttarakhand, in northern India, covering a territory of 3,900 km². However, the figures are uncertain as indigenous people in areas frequented by the Tigers have claimed twice that number.

Moreover, they do not consider victims who survived direct attacks but died afterward. The two tigers were killed by Jim Corbett, the most famous hunter of "man-eating" Tigers. Jim Corbett National Park was later named after him in tribute to this wildlife lover.

3) The man-eater of Bhimashankar

 One story was discovered by Pune-based author Sureshchandra Warghade when he met an old villager in a forest near his home. The villager told him how a man-eating Tiger terrorized the entire Bhimashankar region for two years in the 1940s. He was a police officer in that area and was responsible for handling death paperwork (missing person reports and death certificates) and other duties such as assisting in hunting parties.

During this period, the Tiger has killed more than 100 people, but it carefully disposed of their remains, with only two bodies ever being found. Several hunts were organized, but the only effective one was that of an Ambegaon-based hunter named Ismail. On his first attempt, Ismail had a confrontation with the Tiger and came close to being killed. He then called his friend Kenneth Anderson, and the two of them went back to eliminate the man-eater. The Tiger mostly killed the villagers sleeping outside the huts and the village.

The authenticity of the story told by the villager was confirmed when official reports were examined in addition to the certificate issued by the British authorities after killing the man-eating Tiger.

In summary

 Tiger attacks do not happen by chance but rather reflect a disregard for natural laws. All wild animals have the predatory instinct to defend their natural habitat. In tourist sites such as safaris, humans come to disturb the Tiger for their pleasure. It is not surprising that this Asian animal needs to be left in peace, away from tourists. The safest place to admire it up close is on a wall, and a tiger canvas brings photographic scenes and painted portraits of the animal into the home.

With its sharp claws, this species is not made to live with human presence. Its dangerousness knows very few limits; it can kill a person by biting the neck.

The big cats such as the Tiger must therefore receive special protection so that we can ensure their conservation while avoiding new massacres. India has understood this by setting up more than 50 tiger reserves across the country. Thanks to these actions, the Tigers can hunt the deer herds in peace and leave the local populations alone. To see how the population has responded, read how many tigers are left in India.

The Tiger is an endangered animal; some of its subspecies have already disappeared. It is urgent to preserve the image of this endangered creature among the general public if we want to conserve it. To demonize this big cat without knowing the actual causes of its actions can only lead to an even greater endangerment of the animal. A kinder image of the tiger often starts in childhood, and the lifelike cubs and round cartoon tigers of our tiger plush collection give children a gentle first picture of the animal.

"Man is born perfectible; the animal is born perfect.

Louis de Bonald

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