Animal Diaries Archive

Our little girl Singha!

31 August 2007

As many of you are probably aware, out of our five tigers here at the Zoo, we only have one female. So the answer is 'yes' if you were thinking... I bet she gets spoilt! Luckily enough, there is no jealousy from the other tigers as all of our animals receive the utmost care, attention, affection and respect from their handlers.

Singha, and her two brothers Ranu and Juma are now just over the age of three and the handlers are beginning to see a change of behaviour as they are starting to become sexually mature. The average age for tigers to become sexually mature is around 2.5 - 3 years in the wild depending on the individual.

Whist the boys have just been, well, typical boys, Singha is being very flirtatious and affectionate to everyone, but is paying particular interest to one of our males Manas. Manas is one of our Bengal tigers and of late has been the most dominant tiger at Australia Zoo.

But for Singha, it will be a couple of years yet before she will venture into the life of becoming a mother. Hopefully we will get some Sumatran cubs in the near future and Singha will pick a handsome male from the litter to father the first litter of cubs to be born at Australia Zoo.