Tiger size
Tiger types
Tiger travel
Cat aggression
Cat DNA
Cheetah classification
Lion differences
Cat speed
Tiger tolerance
Tiger defenses
Q: On Cat Aggression
Are all wild cats aggressive?
A: It depends on what you mean by aggression. Wild cats attack in order to obtain food, and also as a pre-emptive measure to drive away or destroy a threat. They don't attack just for the sake of it. Some individuals among the big cats may begin to see people as potential food and become man-eaters, particularly if the cat is incapacitated by injury or age. Most attacks on people take place when a cat is taken by surprise, feels threatened and even cornered. A female may attack to defend her cubs. Many times such an "attack" is just a scare tactic, and the cat swerves away without making physical contact. Even when there is physical contact in such cases, the victim is seldom eaten and may survive injuries.
Q: I've heard that the tiger leads the big cats in number of attacks on people. Is this true? If so, is it because the tiger is the most aggressive of the big cats or is it just because it resides in India, where the population is so dense?
A: Tigers, lions and leopards are the only cats that can become a serious danger to humans, although in recent years cougars have killed or seriously injured people in the United States. The jaguar could be dangerous, but there are few records of attacks. I don't think there is any difference in the big cats' nature. Tigers certainly have a bad reputation, mainly because of reports from India, where British officials have publicized them as man-eaters, telling gory stories of hunting them down. Nowadays there is a highly active news media, which reports any attacks. In fact, it is only in the Sundarbans mangrove forests of India and Bangladesh that tiger attacks are fairly common; the reason for the aggressiveness has not been established. Leopards often live very close to people in the Indian subcontinent and attacks on people, particularly children, are not uncommon. Certainly the dense population in the subcontinent is a factor. Lions attack people in Africa, but there is little publicity because the media is not as developed as in India. As I said in answer to another question, "aggression" is usually a pre-emptive attack by a big cat that feels threatened by the surprise close approach of a human.