What is a Tigon?
Yesterday, I wrote an article explaining what a liger is. Today, I’ll explain what a tigon is.
A tigon is a hybrid cross between a male tiger and a female lion. Tigons can carry characteristics from either parent. For example, a tigon can carry spots (from it’s mother - lion cubs are spotted), or stripes (from it’s father).
Note that a tigon is only produced from a male tiger and a female lion. If a male lion mates with a female tiger, another animal is produced - a liger.
Tigons are not as common as ligers. This wasn’t always the case though. There was a time when tigons were more common than ligers.
A male tigon may carry a mane, but if it does, it will be smaller than a lion’s mane.
Unlike ligers, which grow to be much larger than both of their parents, tigons never grow as big as either of their parents. This is because they inherit growth-inhibitory genes from the mother. Having said this, they can still grow to be quite big - tigons can often weigh up to 400 lbs.
Tigons cannot breed with each other. This is because, although female tigons are fertile, male tigons are sterile. This is also the case with ligers.
Like ligers, tigons are only produced in captivity. Because of its human assisted ancestory, there is no scientific name given to the tigon.
Tags: hybrid, liger, tiger, tigon, wild cats
