Tigress Katrina of Bor Tiger Reserve delivers third litter in three years

The Bor Tiger Reserve saw an increase in its tiger population when tigress Katrina delivered her third litter in 2.5 years, with a gap of just 14 months between each litter. It is generally perceived that a tigress rears its cubs for 2 years before delivering another litter. The Cubs are now three months old. Katrina is the dominant female of the Bor Tiger Reserve near Nagpur in Maharashtra. The authorities monitoring the tigress said that Katrina delivered the first litter of four cubs (2 males and 2 females) in October 2014. The second litter of three (2 females and 1 male) cubs was born on January 2016, and now the third litter in March 2017. Although one cub was killed by a wild dog last year, all the other cubs did well and scattered into the buffer zone and other forest areas through the fragmented corridors. Currently, the tigress with a record number of 26 cubs from seven litters is MP Pench's Collarwali. Katrina has six more years to go in the wild and it is predicted that if she delivers 3-4 cubs per litter, she can give birth to 20 more cubs and break Collarwali's record.