“The white tiger is produced by a genetic fluke that occurs when two orange tigers with rare recessive forms of a gene called alleles happen to breed” city zoo in-charge Dr Uttam Yadav said. He added that white tigers in the wild are so rare that they have only been seen a handful of times in recorded history with the last known wild white tiger killed in 1958. Excitement up for Black Tiger! Black Tigers are like White Tigers not a unique subspecies. Rather they are Bengal Tigers with what is known as pseudo-melanism. Pure melanism refers to a large amount of black pigmentation of the hair / fur / feathers eyes and so on. Yadav said that soon the visitors of the city will be able to see the black tiger. It has white stripes on its body. The white coloured stripes on the tiger cause genetic error. This rare species of tiger is found only in Odisha in India. The 2020 tiger census report states that the number of black-striped tigers is declining at a rapid pace. City zoo authorities sent a proposal to acquire a melanistic tiger and a king cobra before the corona pandemic. Work is underway to add more than five animal species including some exotic ones to its population within the next three to four months. “We have already sent proposals to Hyderabad and Trivandrum for exchange of a pair of white tigers with some of our zoo inmates. A similar proposal has also been sent to Bilaspur zoo as they also have an extra of white tiger” said Yadav. He added that the population of these tigers is extremely low.

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