Tigress T4, also known as Patdev, has given birth to four more cubs in Madhya Pradesh's Pench Tiger Reserve, taking her offspring tally to 20, officials said on Tuesday. Patdev is the daughter of supermom 'Collarwali', who gave birth to 29 cubs over a span of 11 years, they said.
On Monday, some officials and visitors during a safari spotted tigress T4 with four cubs, Pench Tiger Reserve's deputy director Rajneesh Singh told PTI. This was the first time that tigress T4 was spotted with her cubs, who appeared to be about two months' old, he said.
The tigress has so far given birth to 20 cubs in five litters since 2014, the official said. Singh said T4 was born in 2010 to tigress Collarwali, who gave birth to 29 cubs in eight litters between 2008 and 2018. Collarwali died at the age of 17 in June last year.
Tigress T4, who is about 12 years' old now, had given birth to four cubs for the first time in 2014 but two of them later died. Madhya Pradesh was at the top position in the 2018 tiger census after it was found to be home to 526 felines, two more than Karnataka (524). Uttarakhand held the third position with 442 big cats. The estimated count of tigers in India had increased from 1,411 in 2006 to 2,967 in 2018, according to the last census report.
Madhya Pradesh has a number of tiger reserves including Kanha, Bandhavgarh, Pench, Satpura, Panna and Sanjay Dubri.