The conservation status is wrong for a Sumatran
What’s your thoughts on another tiger?
- Thread starter paul78
- Start date
Good point - gimme 5 min
There is quite a difference in appearance between Sumatran Tigers and other tigers. I can't believe some people are arguing about that. But, that being said, I personnally don't wish for a third tiger in PZ.
@ElectricMonk not that it really matters lol but that is hardly what the Sumatran tiger looks like. @TheHippoGirl is right the difference between whether you want a third tiger or not which is totally ok is undeniable and fairly obvious. The Sumatran is even a different species of tiger in the new taxonomy.
It is still just a subspecies in the new Definition. It is the other way, all the other subspecies are formed into one "big" subspecies meaning we would have only two subspecies of tigers. But this is again controversial like so often in taxonomy. And in case of subspecies in General there is not a very clear definition at all how to divide to be honest.
Really? Id love to read about that I’d you have a source? (Genuinely- not being sarcastic)
edit: my understanding was the same as what becks has said.
@becks474 I’m not a big believer in the new taxonomy myself and much prefer the former. Anyway my only point is the Sumatran is by far the most unique looking tiger. The only other tiger that looks somewhat different is the Malayan arguably. The Sumatran on the other hand clearly looks different.@ElectricMonk my mistake two subspecies but still the fact remains and the only true argument here is the Sumatran involves more then simply resizing a Bengal tiger and calling it a Sumatran. Like I said I’m totally ok with people not wanting a third tiger that was the point of the thread. Me personally I wouldn’t mind some more clone animals like a second giraffe, wildebeest, crocodile, ect. But at the same time I definitely get the wasted slot thinking. Like I said tho the point is the Sumatran does have very noticeable differences in more then just size.
Last edited:
The shorter ruff Sumatran tiger does look closer but still has different facial features. Truthfully if frontier did make the Sumatran a rescaled Bengal I’d be pretty disappointed as the majority of individuals look noticeably different. It’s fairly obvious from the pics I posted above comparing the two species the Sumatran clearly looks different. Even if you take out the ruff of the tiger it’s still pretty noticeable.
No. It’s clear from the photos you posted above that some Sumatran tigers look different to some bengal tigers. From some (very quick) reading, both (especially the bengal) vary quite a lot morphologically - the biggest and most consistent difference is their size. In other respects they overlap substantially (though their are differences in the average and variance of their features) The photo I posted above was not chosen to look as close as possible to a bengal tiger - it was literally the first image of the google search.
I personally would not mind having another species of tiger, because I know that the model would be much better than the Bengal tiger, I do not like that model and I know that if we get another tiger the modeling would be very good
However, I consider that realism is too subjective and if I like to build my zoos, it is certainly realistic at times, and being from Latin America, the only common tiger species here is the "Bengal tiger." The Siberian tiger is certainly much more popular than the one from Sumatra here, despite the fact that it is not an ideal place for one, there are very few zoos in Latin America that have Sumatran tigers in their collection, so for me in the context of a realistic zoo, I would not use them much more often than the one from Bengal
However, I consider that realism is too subjective and if I like to build my zoos, it is certainly realistic at times, and being from Latin America, the only common tiger species here is the "Bengal tiger." The Siberian tiger is certainly much more popular than the one from Sumatra here, despite the fact that it is not an ideal place for one, there are very few zoos in Latin America that have Sumatran tigers in their collection, so for me in the context of a realistic zoo, I would not use them much more often than the one from Bengal
I'd absolutely love to see the Sumatran tiger make it into the game! They are my favourite animals in general (and always at the top of my list of animals to try and see when I visit a real-life zoo that houses them), and it would make sense for the species to eventually make an appearance in PZ given that they are classed as critically endangered. 
Absolute agree. Don't understand how the Arguments above are supposed to make any Sense. It's like claiming that we don't need a American Flamingo because we already have the Greater Flamingo which totally looks the same
Absolutely agree. I like to play realistic and I know it's the same with many other People. Also important for Europe. Bengal Tigers were kept a lot in EAZA Zoos in the Past but they aren't anymore. The only Zoo that is listed on Zootierliste in their Category Non-EU and other EAZA countries where you still find Bengal Tigers is the Taipei Zoo in Taiwan.
| Subspecies | Europe | Non-EU and other EAZA countries |
| Sumatran Tiger | 36 | 22 |
| Siberian Tiger | 126 | 63 |
| Indochinese Tiger | 0 | 0 |
| Malayan Tiger | 8 | 3 |
| South China Tiger | 0 | 0 |
| Bengal Tiger | 0 | 1 |
| No Subspecies | 133 | 46 |
Thanks for posting. Didn't know how different the Head Shapes are
There is one main difference. We only have had one flamingo species whereas we have two tiger subspecies. And an American Flamingo also is another species which is also important for some people. But to be honest, I want neither a second Flamingo (I prefer other and distinct Habitat birds like Emu, Kiwi, Pelicans, Capercaillie,...), nor a third brown bear (I prefer spectacled or sloth bear), nor a second lion or leopard and a also not a third tiger (I prefer the smaller cats like ocelot, caracal, serval). I mean, everybody is free to wish whatever she or he wants, this is okay, and yes, I can see the differences between the tiger subspecies. But having a look on the meta wishlist the Sumatran Tiger is somewhere in the middle of nowhere with only 14 votes I think whereas the smaller cats I have mentioned are all around 100 votes. I can understand the personal wish for this subspecies but for the general customer the other choices seem to be a much higher choice to go.Absolute agree. Don't understand how the Arguments above are supposed to make any Sense. It's like claiming that we don't need a American Flamingo because we already have the Greater Flamingo which totally looks the same
Last edited:
I’d prefer a second Lion tbh - the difference in look between some Asiatic/West African and Southern Lions is pretty distinct. I do get the original ask though as the Sumatran Tiger is so popular in Zoos, is more distinctive looking and potentially is probably the most endangered out of Amur, Bengal and Sumatran (especially given the direction of population changes recently).
I’d happily build a zoo of cats - I do enjoy going to zoos to see all animals but that’s the animal group I search out, and read about, and do fundraising for etc But I don’t expect any more official big cats in the game for a while personally - principally because of the restricted resource to make new animals probably leads Frontier to a prioritisation to include different animal groups and the ‘customers’ who may be attracted by their favourite animals.
I love Planet Zoo but I’d love it even more if they were able to ‘churn out’ more animals and subspecies. I get that a lot of work goes into the releases each time but perhaps it would be nice to see some of the mods embraced to enable a faster build of roster in parallel to the hard work that goes into the official animals. I deliberately waited to purchase Planet Zoo until i knew there was a way for the modding community to build animals as they did for Zoo tycoon - because I knew I’d personally get less from the game until there would be a number of species/subspecies of cat to focus on. Using those mods in the short term won’t stop me from buying the official dlc’s when released but they do help continue/carry my interest in the game in the meantime. That’s just me though - I’m sure others feel the same about dogs, or bears, or penguins etc (fair play to them) and Planet Zoo obviously needs to cater for all of us which is tough to balance.
I’d happily build a zoo of cats - I do enjoy going to zoos to see all animals but that’s the animal group I search out, and read about, and do fundraising for etc But I don’t expect any more official big cats in the game for a while personally - principally because of the restricted resource to make new animals probably leads Frontier to a prioritisation to include different animal groups and the ‘customers’ who may be attracted by their favourite animals.
I love Planet Zoo but I’d love it even more if they were able to ‘churn out’ more animals and subspecies. I get that a lot of work goes into the releases each time but perhaps it would be nice to see some of the mods embraced to enable a faster build of roster in parallel to the hard work that goes into the official animals. I deliberately waited to purchase Planet Zoo until i knew there was a way for the modding community to build animals as they did for Zoo tycoon - because I knew I’d personally get less from the game until there would be a number of species/subspecies of cat to focus on. Using those mods in the short term won’t stop me from buying the official dlc’s when released but they do help continue/carry my interest in the game in the meantime. That’s just me though - I’m sure others feel the same about dogs, or bears, or penguins etc (fair play to them) and Planet Zoo obviously needs to cater for all of us which is tough to balance.
On the other hand, we could look at actual data which includes variation within subspecies (rather than a graphic specifically designed to distinguish (and therefore exaggerate the differences) among subspecies:
THIS PAPER (I don't know if you'll be able to access it) compares phenotypic variation (skull morphology, patterning and skin colour) between the 2 currently accepted subspecies: the continental subspecies (T. t. tigris) and the island subspecies (T. t. sondaica) (as well as between northern and southern tigers within the continental subspecies).
Much is pretty technical but the main conclusion is that, yes, the non-continental tigers form a distinct clade (subspecies) which differs morphologically on average from the continental subspecies (although the northern populations within the continental subspecies differ even more from both the others despite being genetically nested within the continental subspecies (T. t. tigris). However, as can be seen from figures 3 and 4 (below), there is very substantial overlap between the two subspecies in terms of all of the morphological characteristics measured - especially between southern continental tigers (what used to be classified as Bengal tigers and other southern subspecies) and the Island subspecies (i.e., Sumatran tigers; to see this, look at the overlap of the blue and red circles on figure 3).
Overall, yes, there are differences between the average 'Bengal" and 'Sumatran' tiger, but, there is very substantial overlap between them - In other words, it is perfectly reasonable to use the in-game Bengal tiger (especially if a small individual is chosen) to represent/fill in for a Sumatran tiger. To argue that they are totally morphologically distinct is not supported by actual data - the morphologies overlap substantially. If we had unlimited spots to fill then, yes, I'd love a Sumatran tiger (indeed, I would have preferred they were in the game to begin with rather than the Bengal tiger) but, given that we know there are not unlimited spots available, I would much prefer that currently unfilled niches were filled first - and there are a LOT of unfilled niches yet to be filled.
FIGURE 3
FIGURE 4
Last edited: