Difference Between Tiger and Jaguar

Tiger vs Jaguar

Both the animals are from the Felidae family and Panther genus. The Tiger is mostly known for its appearance with vertical stripes on bright yellow or orange coat. The Jaguar generally has spots on a yellow coat.

The jaguars are sometimes also found to have black base coats with the spots on them. The spots, however, would not be visible when seeing the animal from a distance. The tigers are not recorded to have a black variation.

The tigers have nine distinct subspecies with 2 of them extinct and only 7 existing while the jaguars still do not have distinctly recognized subspecies. There is still controversy jaguars having 8 or none subspecies.

The tigers are the largest of the big cats with the weights up to 300 kgs. The weights generally vary with between the subspecies and the regions with the largest subspecies being the Siberian Tiger and the smallest being the Sumatran Tiger. The Sumatran Tiger may weigh up to 140 kgs. The larger jaguars have been found to weigh approximately 150 kgs. The smaller ones are found to weigh as low as 40 kgs. The female jaguars would normally weigh 10 to 20 % less than the male while in tigers the male is generally 1.7 times larger than the female.

While the tigers have been natives of Asia and Siberia the jaguars have been natives of North and South Americas.

The other difference is in the reproduction cycle. While the female tigers reach the sexual maturity at age around 3 ‘“ 4 years the males reaches the maturity between 4 ‘“ 5 years. The gestation period in tigers is approximately 16 weeks. The female jaguars reach the sexual maturity at around 2 years of age while the males reach maturity between 3-4 years. The gestation period is approximately 13 ‘“ 14 weeks. Tigers have been found to breed well in captivity while the jaguars do not.

Another difference is that Tigers like most big cats generally kill their prey by attacking and sinking their teeth in the neck, however, the jaguars prefer to pierce its teeth directly in the skull between the ears of the prey.

Summary
1.The Tiger is mostly known for its appearance with vertical stripes on bright yellow or orange coat. The Jaguar generally has spots on a yellow coat.
2.The tigers are the largest of the big cats with the weights up to 300 kgs whereas jaguars weigh approximately 150 kgs.
3.While the female tigers reach the sexual maturity age around 3 ‘“ 4 years with gestation period in tigers is approximately 16 weeks. The female jaguars reach the sexual maturity at around 2 years of age with gestation period is approximately 13 ‘“ 14 weeks.

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