Talk:White tiger

Woah - an article written entirely by anonymous users! *impressed* Just a few comments: should this article be moved to white tiger, following Wikipedia naming guidelines? Also, the article needs proper categorization and better formatting, so I'm putting up a stub warning. But seriously, awesome jobs - you guys should sign up! Cheers, Gaurav 19:49, 13 Mar 2005 (UTC)

"The beautiful white specimen shown at the top of this page displays some evidence of breeding depression in having crossed eyes."

Uhh, what specimen? >.> I don't see anything only nacked sexy ladies.

nor do i. is the text copied from somewhere?? Xah Lee 07:18, 2005 Apr 30 (UTC)

Does anyone have information on the "Pure White Tiger"? It's origination?

165.139.228.115 17:44, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Korean version

I just restored the deleted material but I don't seem to have the correct Korean fonts on this computer. Can someone put them back from here. Thanks. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 15:02, 20 July 2006 (UTC)

The bengal tiger has the same things to face as a tiger.

Question to you people.

Are you all studying the white tiger? If so...you can google white tiger. Duh.-.-

Uhh, maybe not, we just want our articlesto look good for people who are. Utube video was cute!

THE WHITE TIGER HAS BEEN INBRED BY CAPITALIST PIGS BEYOND ALL HOPE. MOST ARE BORN WITH DEFECTS AND NEVER REACH ADULTHOOD. There's a reason why you don't reproduce with your own family, and the only way to ensure more cubs, zoos inbreed them constantly. This cruelty needs to stop and I feel this wiki page is part of the problem, not even taking the issue seriously. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 169.231.8.69 (talk) 21:15, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

Most are born with defects and never reach adulthood? Where did you get this ridiculous idea? The vast majority of white tigers reach adulthood. Most of what you read about white tigers on the internet is untrue. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.1.195.5 (talk) 15:28, 16 June 2008 (UTC)

Truth: http://www.bigcatrescue.org/cats/wild/white_tigers.htm - I can only show you the door, you're the one that has to walk through it.--189.122.8.50 (talk) 07:40, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

You should'nt believe everything you read on the internet. In fact you should'nt believe most of what you read on the internet. If you want to know the truth about white tigers read a book on the subject. The white tiger wikipedia has been researched from sources in several university libraries, including McGill in Montreal and Carleton in Ottawa, Canada. It is intended to be an unbiased presentation of factual information on white tigers.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.1.195.4 (talk • contribs) 17:39, 21 January 2009

infant mortality

Ed Maruska, the director of the Cincinnati Zoo, had this to say on the subject of the white tiger's infant mortality rate: " We have not experienced premature death among our white tigers. Forty-two animals born in our collection are still living. Mohan, a large white tiger, died just short of his 20th birthday, an enviable age for a male of any subspecies since most males live shorter lives in captivity. Premature deaths in other collections may be artifacts of captive environmental conditions." " In 52 births we had four stillbirths, one of which was an unexplained loss. We lost two additional cubs from viral pneumonia, which is not excessive. Without data from non-inbred tiger lines, it is difficult to determine whether this number is high or low with any degree of accuracy." Maruska, Edward J., "White Tiger Phantom Or Freak?", Chapter 33, Part IV White Tiger Politics, Tigers Of The World, The Biology, Biopolitics, Management And Conservation Of An Endangered Species, Noyes Publications, Park Ridge, New Jersey USA 1987, pg. 374 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.1.195.4 (talk) 15:32, 27 January 2009 (UTC) 70 white tigers have been born at the Cincinnati Zoo. The vast majority have survived to adulthood. If white tigers did have an infant mortality of 80% (obviously they do not) it would be impossible to know this since nobody has kept statistics on every white tiger birth in captivity to date. Cheetahs are extremely inbred and have an infant mortality rate between 90 and 95%. "The Cheetah Orphans-What Makes A Rehabilitation Project Work?" Nature http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes/the-cheetah-orphans/what-makes-a-rehabilitation-program-work/24/ Science Now http://bric.postech.ac.kr/science/97now/98_8now/980804c.html The purpose of the white tiger wikipedia article is not to address whether or not white tigers should be kept and bred in captivity, but just to present factual information on the subject, in an unbias manner. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.1.195.4 (talk) 15:48, 27 January 2009 (UTC) PS Ed Maruska testified in the trial of the veterinarian who stole five white tiger cubs.

Genes "switched off"

I think that stating that a white tiger simply has orange genes that are "switched off" is more accurate than simply stating that a white gene is non-exsistant. It is my knowledge that this is true and far more informative as far as biology and genetics goes. Perhaps a link to the page on genes in animals would be a nice addition as well. Anyone agree? --Catmoongirl 07:17, 1 August 2007 (UTC)

Extent of Population?

Shouldn't the extent of where they reside be listed? Drakonis 15:48, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

article

If by extent of population you mean geographic range that is covered under "Historical Records". Why have the graphic showing the endangered status of the Bengal tiger when white tigers are not synonymous with Bengal tigers? All of the portions of the article dealing with Chediak-Hegashi Syndrome, anaesthesia and tryosinase, crossed eyes and the visual pathway abnormality, Siamese cats, Himilayan rabbits and albino ferrets, and the mutated form of tryosinase which makes the fur of white tigers and Siamese cats grow darker in reaction to cold (tryosinase is not mentioned in the article in this connection, but it should be. It is in the Siamese cat wikipedia article.) should be moved from the "Inbreeding Depression" category to the section dealing with genetics and albinism. White tigers do not have Chediak-Hegashi Syndrome. Mohini was tested for it in 1960 and this is discussed in the article "The White Tiger Enigma" which is included in the bibliographical section of the wikipedia article. It should be stressed that the catalogue of inbreeding related problems listed and attributed to K.S. Sankhala were reported in pure-Bengal white tigers, not hybrids. Sankhala was the director of the New Delhi Zoo and his only experience was with pure-Bengal white tigers. He wrote about this in his book "Tiger!". There is only one case of a white tiger having central retinal degeneration and this may have had nothing to do with inbreeding or genetics. There is a rumor which has been widely circulated on the internet that white tigers have an 80% infant mortality rate. This is completely false. My apologies to Drakonis I did'nt mean to put this under his heading, but I hope I was able to answer his question.

Truth on White Tigers

Question: Why is this article full of the misconception that this "species" is endangered? It's not a species. It's a genetic mutation promulgated by zoos via inbreeding. Technically this "species" is severely over-populated and will be until it no longer exists.

Answer: Nowhere does the article state that white tigers are a species or that they are endangered. The graphic refers to the Bengal tiger as endangered. The article never claims that white tigers are a species, much less an endangered species. White tigers are tigers and tigers are an endangered species. In India white tigers are considered part of the culture and national treasures. In India white tigers are a subpopulation of the endangered Bengal tiger.

Conservation Value

Okay, I took out some of the biased language (I replaced "freaks with no conservation value" with "anomalies that do not have the same conservation value," etc.) but we really need some sources on the idea that white tigers do not have any conservation value. Common sense seems to tell me that a general wild tiger population will have a few white tigers in it, just like human populations have a few purple-eyed humans in them, and I can see why breeding a pretty but not representative form of the animal wouldn't be the best conservation strategy, but can anyone back it up with studies or articles or quotes from the experts?12.144.50.194 (talk) 22:18, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes Ron Tilson of the Minnesota Zoo and Catherine Latinen who was with the Detroit Zoo. They're experts, but it seems to be the opinion of just about everybody that white tigers have no value to conservation. Also John Seidensticker of the National Zoo. Here's another one: Karanth, K. Ullas, The Way of the Tiger, Voyager Press Inc. 2001. pg. 16 "White tigers are genetic mutants derived by repeatedly crossbreeding the progeny derived from a single wild caught ancestor (he's wrong about that). While white tigers are undoubtedly cute oddities, they have little conservation value." I just found this in "The Year Of The Tiger" pg. 82 "but geneticists consider such animals' bloodlines useless for maintaining healthy captive populations of distinct subspecies." There are no white tigers in wild populations. I don't think there are any purple eyed humans. Thank you for the suggestions. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 167.128.186.201 (talk) 20:24, 20 March 2008 (UTC)

I think there is a misunderstanding. People seem to believe that white tigers are somehow distinct from "regular" tigers, whereas the comparison is more like red-headed v. blonde humans. The actual human underneath the hair is the same regardless of hair colour. "Freaks with no conservation value" is correct, in the sense that "freak" is not used in the sense of "abnormality which should be removed" (the kind humans react strongly to, hence the perception of the word being loaded) but just "abnormal". 118.90.17.167 (talk) 22:38, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

Family trees

I think this article would benefit from some family trees. From what I understand, Mohan was bred with his daughter Radha and then he was bred with the product of that union, granddaughter-daughter Sukeshi to produce tigers who were simutaneously his children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Some of these were bred in lines issuing from Radha's full-sisters, so there are tigers with many, many more lines from him. Charles 21:45, 15 May 2008 (UTC)This sounds like a great idea, but I would'nt know how to do it. Thanks for the suggestion.

Bot report : Found duplicate references !

In the last revision I edited, I found duplicate named references, i.e. references sharing the same name, but not having the same content. Please check them, as I am not able to fix them automatically :)

• "Sankhala" :
  • [[Kailash Sankhala]] 1976
  • This creates a controversy about color-based inbreeding, since is possible to produce white tigers from unrelated parents-- examples are given below in the sections on Tony and The Orissa White Tigers-- but in practice, such cases are exceedingly rare.<ref name="Iverson"> Iverson, S.J., (1982) "Breeding white tigers." Zoogoer 11:5-12;

DumZiBoT (talk) 11:13, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Neverending Story

This sprawling mess is approximately the same length as the article on World War II. Since the subject of "white tigers" has been appropriately classified as "mid-importance," a summary would suffice.drone5 (talk) 00:45, 30 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree. This article exists only because in popular discourse these are seen as different from other tigers. There is nothing to distinguish white tigers from their Bengal tiger relatives otherwise. 118.90.17.167 (talk) 23:50, 10 February 2009 (UTC)

The size of the article will reflect the time that an author is willing to put into it. In the case of WWII it is useful to note that whole sections have been spun out into other articles. Something that might be hard to do here. CambridgeBayWeather Have a gorilla 00:17, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Taxobox

From my talk page "Surely the taxobox should be used only on articles about a particular genus/species/etc.? White tigers do not constitute a species on their own, and only hold significance in popular discourse. As I wrote on the edit summary, red headed humans and blonde humans are both Homo sapiens sapiens but red heads don't get to have a taxobox. 118.90.17.167 (talk) 23:52, 10 February 2009 (UTC)"

I disagree with the reasoning. Yes the white tiger is not a seperate genus/species but I think that the box helps people to understand that. Though it should be noted that different breeds of dogs don't get taxoboxes. CambridgeBayWeather Have a gorilla 00:17, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

The taxobox does not belong of this page since it is not about a taxonomic group, the species where the box belongs is linked in the intro. Hardyplants (talk) 01:13, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

this makes no sense

This article really needs to be cleaned up. It seems all over the place and keeps repeating things over and over again. And I found this gem in the article on inbreeding:

The white gene is recessive, and therefore must be inherited from both parents, to produce a white tiger. Inbreeding is a conscious strategy to promote homozygosity in white tigers. There's really no such thing as a white gene. Rather white tigers carry orange genes which are latent, switched off or suppressed by an inhibitor, which is the chinchilla gene.

So the entire time the article has been talking about there being a white gene.. and now its really not a gene at all? Erm. -- 205.200.0.105 (talk) 18:51, 25 February 2009 (UTC)