Counter stripe: Why are our big cats changing colour?
Hindustan TimesIt turns out a tiger can change its stripes, in a manner of speaking. The black tiger Odisha’s Similipal National Park is home to the world’s only population of pseudo-melanistic tigers in the wild. “We know it’s a recessive trait, which means that any tiger presenting as pseudo-melanistic has received two copies of the gene, one each from the father and mother,” says Uma Ramakrishnan, a molecular ecologist with NCBS. “India doesn’t have black wolves,” says Bilal Habib, a large-carnivore ecologist with WII. “In India, this kind of cross-breeding is likely occurring in low-density fringes where small wolf populations are sharing their habitats with human populations.” The next step, Habib says, would be to study where the black wolves are emerging, and ascertain whether these are isolated events or a trend that could disperse these genes to other populations.
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The mystery of the 'black tigers' of Similipala | In Focus podcast
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Odisha's ‘black tigers’ owe their appearance to genetic mutation, Indian scientists find
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Tiger that changed its stripes: Scientists solve mystery of Odisha's 'black tigers'
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