- published: 30 Dec 2012
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The Siberian tiger (Panthera tigris altaica), also known as the Amur tiger, is a tiger subspecies inhabiting mainly the Sikhote Alin mountain region with a small subpopulation in southwest Primorye province in the Russian Far East. In 2005, there were 331–393 adult-subadult Amur tigers in this region, with a breeding adult population of about 250 individuals. The population has been stable for more than a decade due to intensive conservation efforts, but partial surveys conducted after 2005 indicate that the Russian tiger population is declining.
The Siberian tiger is the largest living felid and ranks among the biggest felids that ever existed.
Phylogeographic analysis with extant tiger subspecies suggests that less than 10,000 years ago the ancestor of Amur and Caspian tigers colonized Central Asia via the Gansu−Silk Road corridor from eastern China then subsequently traversed Siberia eastward to establish the Amur tiger population in the Russian Far East.
The Siberian tiger is reddish-rusty or rusty-yellow in colour, with narrow black transverse stripes. The body length is not less than 150 cm (59 in), condylobasal length of skull 250 mm (9.8 in), zygomatic width 180 mm (7.1 in), and length of upper carnassial tooth over 26 mm (1.0 in) long. It has an extended supple body standing on rather short legs with a fairly long tail. It is typically 5–10 cm (2.0–3.9 in) taller than the Bengal tiger, which is about 107–110 cm (42–43 in) tall.