The Golden Tabby Tiger

The golden tiger has its white coat and gold patches due to an extremely rare colourvariation caused by a recessive gene. Around 30 tigers are believed to exist in the world but many more are carriers of the gene. Records of the golden or strawberry tiger date back to the 1900s, in India. The first golden tiger cub born in captivity was in 1983 and this came from standard colored Bengal tigers.

A golden tabby tiger is one with an extremely rare color variation caused by a recessive gene and is currently only found in captive tigers. Like the white tiger, it is a color form and not a separate species. In the case of the golden tiger, this is the wide band gene; while the white tiger is due to the color inhibitor (chinchilla) gene. There are currently believed to be fewer than 30 of these rare tigers in the world, but many more carriers of the gene.

White Bengal Tiger Born Without Stripes

For Fareeda, a six-month-old female Bengal tiger cub, being a rare white tiger just isn’t cool enough. She also has no stripes.

Fareeda was born at the Cango Wildlife Ranch in South Africa last Christmas. Part of a litter of three white tigers, Fareeda’s lack of stripes wasn’t something the keepers at the Cango Wildlife Ranch had counted on. Noticing that only two of the three newborn cubs bore the signature stripes, the keepers were delighted, though cautiously optimistic.

Just because a tiger is born without stripes is no guarantee that it will remain that way. “Some cubs develop stripes in their first few months,” said keeper Odette Claassen. “We knew there was the possibility of the cub’s very light black and ginger stripes darkening over time.” But after six months, keepers declared it safe to say that snow-white Fareeda will remain sans stripes.

Fareeda is a part of a special breeding program at the Cape Town sanctuary that aims to perpetuate the rare white Bengal tiger. Most white Bengals are bred in the United States, the majority of them descended from Mohan, a white Bengal male captured and bred in the 1950s. So Fareeda’s birth as part of the ranch’s breeding program already made her special, though not as much as her unusual coat.

White tigers in general no longer exist in the wild, and among the few living in captivity, Fareeda is particularly remarkable. “As far as we know there are only about 20 recorded cases of ‘stripeless’ white tigers in the world,” claims the ranch. All such cases are in captivity in the United States, progenies of Mohan. The missing stripes are the result of a recessive gene carried by both of Fareeda’s parents.