Incredible footage of the moment a dramatic fight broke out between two tigers was captured at an Indian wildlife sanctuary.
The video was posted to Twitter by Parveen Kaswan of the Indian Forest Service. Kaswan captioned the video, “Clash of the titans. Only from India. Best thing you will watch.”
The tigers were walking alongside one another when one suddenly changed direction and headed toward the other, attacking in full force.
While females tend to tolerate one another, males like these are generally a bit more aggressive when dealing with outsiders. Generally, males can solve disputes by intimidating — or submitting to — the other. Once a tiger establishes dominance over another, he’ll generally tolerate the other in his range unless there’s a receptive female nearby, which may have been the case here.
Tigers are solitary animals that control large territories of up to 1,500 square miles in some regions. To establish their territories, males will mark trees by spraying them with urine and anal gland secretions, or mark trails with feces. Sometimes, they’ll scrape the trees or trails with their claws. These scents left by individual tigers provide information about that animal’s sex and reproduce status to others nearby.
These big cats are listed as Endangered on the IUCN Red List, with global wild tiger populations only numbering around 3,900. An estimated 93% of their historical range has been lost, and they continue to face daily threats such as poaching and human-wildlife conflict.
Watch the full video: