One of the largest carnivores on Earth, the tiger has a reputation for being a terrifying predator. It has many different types of prey, ranging from small mammals to bigger species such as buffalo, meaning it has a lot of choices when looking for a meal.
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Because of its vicious reputation, this tiger’s behaviour that was filmed in the National Park of Ranthambore in Rajasthan in India was rather unexpected. While exploring the park, a group of tourists came across a face-off between a tiger and a monkey, with an unexpected outcome.
Thick as thieves!
Instead of trying to eat the primate for dinner as you would expect, the tigress, known by locals as T84 or Arrowhead, preferred to play with him like they were good friends. Clearly not scared of the beast, the black-headed monkey also seemed to want to play with the animal instead of fleeing for his life. Dhirendra Godha, who was there with the make of the video explained:
The incident left the visitors speechless as they watched on.
The tigress didn’t show typical hunting behaviour, such as hiding and stalking its prey before pouncing. And the small monkey was the same and did not hesitate to hit the tigress’ snout on multiple occasions.
A satiated tigress
Even though the scene is surprising, it is not so difficult to explain. It is very likely that the tiger behaved like this because she had just had a big meal and wasn’t hungry enough to consider the monkey as prey.
A tiger of this size normally hunts bigger prey every 8 or 9 days on average. If they have a successful hunt, they can then spend many days without needing to hunt again. Dhirendra said:
It was a really unique experience that is hardly ever witnessed.
