THIS IS SOOOO werid!
OUCH i would Hate 2 be that dog. Maybe she enjoys it. Anyway cute. But ouch. I rate it

Drumroll please

6 out of 10

Thankyou

Wow, I’ve never seen a silver tiger cub before! Amazing. The teeny stripes on the three little tailios (tailii?) just kill me!

I don’t want to derail this too much, but regarding the comment above:

Yes, formula is better for kids, that’s a fact. All I’m saying is that cow’s milk can support babies when formula isn’t available. Before the invention of formula, babies still survived and did well on cow’s milk.

On interspecies milk: Yes,it is best to drink the milk of your own kind as an infant. Technically,if humans wanted to give their babies milk other than their own and not resort to artificial blends, we could survive quite well on pig’s milk. Cow’s milk doesn’t have the right balance of fat and nutrients we need as infants, though you *could* supplement it… But then it’s easier to buy formula or breastfeed.

These tigers probably get some sort of supplement, much as other animals get formulas with cow’s milk bases.

(I’m so proud I didn’t get on my breastfeeding soapbox!)

Hmmm. The colours confuse me, too. Then again, white tigers are produced by a recessive gene, and mostly exist in zoos, due to inbreeding. Their popularity has led to them being bred on purpose, but unfortunately the inbreeding also often leads to birth defects and continuous weakening of the gene pool; therefore some zoos have started experimenting with introducing orange tigers to white tiger “families” as well. Still, I’m not sure how siblings can be of different colours if the gene is recessive…strange? I don’t know enough about genetics to know if it’s possible.

I live in Finland and I’ve heard dogs have been used as foster parents for tigers here as well, maybe for other felines too. Sometimes tigers living in a zoo don’t know how to look after their cubs – due to not living in their natural environment – and using a dog foster mother is considered less risky than bottle-feeding the cub. There are some problems – for example, a tiger would nurse her cubs much more often than a dog, and also the dog mother doesn’t necessarely recognise the tiger cub’s crying to mean it’s hungry (since it sounds so different from a puppy) – but generally cubs fostered this way seem to have better chances for survival.

The dog mother doesn’t always automatically like the tiger cub or want to foster it…but it can often be gradually persuaded to do this. I even read a story about a tiger cub fostered this way – already in the 1960s or 70s – that became the foster mother’s “favourite”, perhaps partly due to her own pup’s teeth being sharper(!) which made it more difficult to nurse him, and after they were separated the mother dog visibly missed the tiger cub for a while. The tiger cub, on the other hand, had something of a hard time adjusting to the zoo after actually living with a human family while she was small; maybe these days this would be better taken into consideration. However, she did adjust gradually and grew up into a healthy adult. It might be her offspring are still living in the same zoo.

so heartwarming!

Re the names: the Chinese will probably have a special Naming Day when the little ones reach 100 days old. At least, that’s what they’ve been doing with the baby pandas in the US zoos. I hope the media keeps an eye on them, I want to see what their coats look like when they get older! Love the non-stripey one!

The tigers totaly look like stuffed animals!
Fluffy!

As for the “different species’ milk” issue, cats can’t be healthy for long on dog food because cats need more protein than dogs do. I would guess that the tigers need some kind of supplement besides Mama Dog’s milk if they’re going to grow up healthy.

Hope Mama doesn’t mind those ouchy little paw-needles….

AARRRRRR, Dagger – good one!
Most adorable tigerettes, and many juicy bones to the Momma doggie.