Why is it in the News?

A rare golden tiger was recently spotted in Kaziranga National Park taking a stroll and is the only known golden big cat in India.

What is a Golden Tiger?

• A Golden Tiger, also called a Golden Tabby Tiger, is a Bengal tiger with a unique colour variation caused by a recessive gene.
• The tiger looks golden because it has a mutation or a genetic variant.
  • Basically, tigers have three colours: black, orange and white.
• In the Golden Tiger, the black colour is missing and it is slightly faded.
  • The golden colouring of these tigers comes from a recessive trait called 'wideband,' affecting how black pigments are produced during hair growth.
• Golden tigers are not a distinct subspecies but rather a product of genetic diversity among Bengal tigers.
• They are extremely rare in the wild and even more so in captivity.

About Kaziranga National Park:

• Kaziranga National Park lies partly in the Golaghat District and partly in the Nagaon District of Assam.
• It is the oldest park in Assam and covers an area of 430 sq km along the river Brahmaputra on the North and the Karbi Anglong hills on the South.
• The National Highway 37 passes through the park area and tea estates, hemmed by table-top tea bushes.
• Kaziranga National Park a world heritage site is famous for the Great Indian one-horned rhinoceros, the landscape of Kaziranga is of sheer forest, tall elephant grass, rugged reeds, marshes & shallow pools.
  • It was declared a National Park in 1974.
• It is one of the last areas in eastern India undisturbed by a human presence.
• It is inhabited by the world's largest population of one-horned rhinoceroses, as well as many mammals, including tigers, elephants, panthers and bears, and thousands of birds.
• Vegetation: Due to the difference in altitude between the eastern and western areas of the park, mainly four main types of vegetation’ like alluvial inundated grasslands, alluvial savanna woodlands, tropical moist mixed deciduous forests, and tropical semi-evergreen forests.
• Flora: Kumbhi, Indian gooseberry, cotton tree, and elephant Apple are among the famous trees that can be seen in the park.
• Fauna: The forest region of Kaziranga Park is home to the world’s largest population of Indian Rhinoceros.
  • Other animals that can be seen in the elephant grass, marshland and dense tropical moist broadleaf forests of Kaziranga are Hoolock Gibbon, Tiger, Leopard, Indian Elephant, Sloth Bear, Wild water buffalo, swamp deer, etc.
  • Also in this park the good number of migratory bird species from Central Asia.

• With the increase in tiger population every year, the government authorities declared Kaziranga a Tiger Reserve in the year 2006.