How Much Meat Can a Tiger Eat in a Day?

A tiger can eat as much as 77 pounds or 35 kg of meat in a day.  After eating that amount, the tiger would not eat for several days.  Usually they eat 33 to 40 pounds or 15 to 18 kg.  If you took all the meat they eat during the year and averaged it out, tigers would eat 15.4 pounds or 7 kg of meat in a day.  Let’s look at tigers and their feeding habits. 

Most agree that a tiger can eat 77 pounds of meat in a day, although some sources suggest he can eat up to as much as 100 pounds in a day.  If he did this, he would certainly not need to eat for some time.

In captivity, tigers are fed five days a week to resemble their normal eating patterns.  How much they eat is calculated by their body weight.  Tigers are fed between four and six percent of their body weight, which comes out to be roughly 9 to 18 pounds of meat a day.

In the wild, tigers will eat deer, pigs, water buffalo, antelope, rhinos, elephant calf, bears, dogs, leopards, crocodiles, monkeys, hares, and pythons.

They will stalk their prey, getting as close as possible.  Then they will charge the animal from behind.  After killing it, the tiger will drag the animal to a safe place and consume as much of it as he can.  If there is any left, he will cover it with grass and dirt to hide it from scavengers.  He will return to snack on it over the next few days.  

Tiger Habitats

All wild tigers live in Asia and can be found in various habitats.  They do not like the grasslands because they need vegetation to hide in.  They live in deciduous and tropical evergreen forests, woodlands, swamps, and jungles.

Visual Characteristics

Tigers are a member of the Felidae family and are the largest of the four big cats in the Panthera genus.  The others are lions, tigers, jaguars, and leopards.  They have white and black tails, white stomachs, and their long, thick coat is a reddish brown or orange color.  Their stripes are black, brown, or gray.  Most have more than 100 stripes and no two tigers’ stripes are identical.   

Types of Tigers

Tigers are an endangered species.  Three types of tiger are extinct: Caspian, Javan, and Bali.  The South Chinese tiger is extinct in the wild.  That leaves only five subspecies in the wild. These are:

• Bengal tiger:  There are more of these than any other subspecies.  They number around 1850 and are also called the Indian tiger.
• Siberian tiger: 450 of these are left and they are also called the Amur tiger.  They are the largest tigers and have the fewest number of stripes and the palest orange coat.
• Malayan tiger: Only around 500 of these remain.  They are found on the Malay Peninsula.
• Sumatran tiger: The island of Sumatra has only about 400 tigers.  They are the smallest tigers
• Indochinese tiger:  There are only about 350 of these left in the wild.  They are found in Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and Burma.

More Tiger Facts

Here are a few more interesting facts:

• Tigers keep their claws sharp just like domestic cats.
• Their claws retract into a protective sheath.
• The roar of a tiger can be heard more than a mile away.
• A group of tigers is called a streak.
• Their lifespan is 10 - 15 years.
• Tigers can weigh between 220 pounds up to 675 pounds.

Tigers were voted the world’s favorite animal in a poll by Animal Planet.