Common Name: Bengal Tiger (White)
Scientific Name: Panthera tigris
Gender: Male
Birth Date: December 1998
History: When a well known theme park decided to phase out some of the animal features, the trainer of the large cat show found himself out of work with thirty-five large mouths to feed. We spend $35 a week to feed one of our current tigers so you can imagine his dilemma. He needed to place a number of large cats and contacted us. Because of the Ark’s reputation, we were offered one of his more valuable animals. In the wild, only 17 white tigers have been seen since 1900. In 1951 a male named Mohan was caught by the Maharaja of Rewa in India. The cat was bred to an orange colored female which gave birth to orange cubs. Later, when Mohan was bred to a daughter, the first litter of white cubs in captivity was born. This is due to a double recessive gene. They are considered valuable by zoos for their ability to attract visitors and thus have sold for as high as $60,000. Khan makes a welcome addition from an educational standpoint and hopefully as an attraction as well. This particular year we were made aware of many tigers that needed to be placed as a number of wildlife facilities ran low on funds or were closed by the United States Department of Agriculture because of violations. Fortunately, many were placed through the efforts of sanctuary associations.