White Tiger Habitat

by Michael
(London, UK)

White Siberian Tiger - Photo by A. Dawson

The white tiger is not a separate species of tiger. Its habitat is, therefore, the same as the other tigers. Except, and this is a big exception, there are very few white tigers left in the wild if any at all and we don't know where they are, either. But there are plenty in captivity where they are bred for commercial reasons (they are very popular). Perhaps it is fair to say that the white tiger habitat is behind bars and in captivity!

There were 8 sub species of tiger. As two are extinct (at April 2009), the 6 that remain are:

• The Bengal tiger or the Royal Bengal tiger (Panthera tigris tigris). This is the tiger species with the highest population currently. It is found in parts of India, Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh and Burma - see Bengal tiger facts and Bengal tiger habitat. The habitat varies and includes: subtropical and tropical rainforests, wet and dry deciduous forests, grasslands, scrub forests and mangroves.
• The Indochinese tiger (Panthera tigris corbetti). This tiger is also called Corbett's tiger after the hunter (I call him a fraud!). This sub species is found in Burma, Thailand, Vietnam,Cambodia, China, and Laos. The habitat they prefer is forests in mountainous and/or hilly regions.
• The Malayan tiger (Panthera tigris jacksoni). This sub species is only found in the southern area of the Malay Peninsula.
• The Sumatran tiger (Panthera tigris sumatrae). This sub species is found exclusively on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. It is critically endangered. Their habitat is thick, dense forests. This has resulted in them evolving into the smallest of the tiger sub species, which is also due to smaller prey.
  
• The Siberian tiger (Panthera tigris altaica). This sub species is also known as the Amur, Manchurian, Altaic, Korean or North China tiger. It's habitat is in the Amur-Ussuri region of Primorsky Krai and Khabarovsk Krai (far eastern Siberia, Russia). See Siberian Tiger Habitat
  
• The South China tiger (Panthera tigris amoyensis). This tiger is also known as the Amoy or Xiamen tiger and it may in fact be extinct.

This map gives a rough idea where the sub species of tiger are. It is a guideline only and is based on the tiger distribution map made and uploaded by Wikipedia user: Flash Gordon1 and published under Wikimedia® creative commons license license = Attribution-ShareAlike License

Here are some photographs from these areas to give a feel for what might be the white tiger habitat.

White Tiger Habitat to Wild cat species

White Tiger Habitat - Photos: published under a Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs creative commons License -- this site is for charitable purposes in funding cat rescue.