“They would pick out an animal that appears to be sick, or kind of lagging behind and they would wait for that animal to be separated a little bit from the herd,” explains Leigh Pitsko, an assistant curator for great cats at the Smithsonian National Zoo in Washington, D.C. To take down their prey, the tiger uses its retractable claws and four-inch-long canine teeth. The stalk-and-ambush hunters are some of the most calculated predators in the animal kingdom. To sustain their impressive size, Bengal tigers can eat up to 75 pounds of meat in one night. To sustain their impressive size, a hungry Bengal tiger can consume as much as 75 pounds of meat in one night. An adult male Bengal tiger can weigh anywhere from 400 to 500 pounds. Unlike rams, adult tigers prefer to live alone and aggressively scent-mark their territory with urine to keep rivals away. “But if they are with their herd-and it would be really rare that they wouldn’t be-then they have safety numbers.” “If it’s one on one, I hate to say it, but the ram is done,” says Vance, describing the imaginary scene of a ram going up against a Bengal tiger. When a ram is with their herd, they’re unlikely to get picked off by a mountain lion, for example-but it’s a different story if the ram is facing a feline predator alone. Female bighorn sheep usually live together in herds that include juveniles, while mature males opt for bachelor-only groups as large as 50. Like other ungulates, rams like to stick by their friends and family. Their battles “can be pretty intense,” says Vance. “You’ll see as the most dominant males get older, the younger males that are getting into their prime will start fighting them,” says Morgan Vance, an ungulate, or hoofed mammal, keeper at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute in Front Royal, Virginia. In the wild, horn size helps determine a ram’s place in their social hierarchy, which is often settled with a bout of head-butting between males.Ī ram's horns and skull can weigh up to 30 pounds-as much as the rest of their bones combined. Their long, curved horns and skull alone can weigh up to 30 pounds-as much as the rest of their bones combined. They'll rarely exceed 300 pounds, or defensive linemen size. Rams, or male bighorn sheep, measure six feet in length and weigh 250 pounds on average, or about the same as the average football player.
#Tiger predators how to#
When going into battle, rams know how to use their heads.
This Sunday, the Los Angeles Rams take on the Cincinnati Bengals in the 56th Super Bowl, and this year’s national championship presents a rare opportunity to speculate on what a showdown might look like between the two species.Īlthough tigers are apex predators and the world’s biggest cats, don’t write off rams just yet. Many of these beasts wouldn’t be found together in the wild, but they do occasionally face off on football’s biggest stage. The animal mascots of the National Football League could fill a small zoo with horses, big cats, bears, dolphins, and assorted birds of prey.