Continental Tiger

It's often difficult to put words to something that you have seen and experienced each day of your life. Even after a decade of being in therianthrope communities, I still struggle to. The core of my self is tigrine; I see the world as a tiger in a human shape. I am not re-experiencing life as an individual whose paws once trod the earth. I was born as a tiger.

Despite being male as a human, the shape of my animality is a tigress. I am a solitary cat residing in taiga and tropical forest alike. I'm far from my home, and time among people has tamed me more than a wild tiger could conceive of. Even so, I still bite.

I am always distinctly feline. This comes complete with instincts and somatosensory map more suited for a large cat than a human. While expressing, I often sense the phantom overlay of large, carnivorous teeth, whiskers, and philtrum belonging on a tiger's snout. When I blink, I can almost feel the nictitating membrane swipe over the surface. The 'proper' human lifestyle can be an uncomfortable contrast against my tigrine apathy and aloofness.

Until recently, I interpreted myself as a member of the Siberian, or Amur, population of Panthera tigris tigris due to an attachment to boreal environments. As time has gone by, the personal lines between populations and habitats have blurred, leading me to redefine myself as a continental tiger.

The continental tiger is one of the names referring to P. t. tigris, the nominal subspecies of tiger, in totality; it includes all mainland populations of tiger. Rather than subspecies in their own right, it’s now understood that tigers such as the Siberian and Bengal are populations of one shared subspecies. Outside the native range of wild tigers, I can align myself with the South China tigers dwelling in South Africa’s Laohu Valley Reserve, especially for their association with the antelopes of the region.