- A new study tracked 15 subadult tigers for over seven years in Maharashtra’s Eastern Vidarbha Landscape to map their movements from natal territories to new home ranges.
- It found that pre-dispersal tigers stayed close to their mothers; dispersing tigers sped through villages and farms while slowing in forests; and post-dispersal tigers stabilised, patrolling forests and crossing farmlands efficiently.
- The findings show that tiger behaviour changes according to age and highlights when they are the most vulnerable, why safe corridors matter, and how wildlife park managers can anticipate conflict hotspots.
When you picture a tiger on the move, you might imagine it slipping quietly through tall grass, pausing at waterholes, or stalking prey under the cover of night. But what happens when that tiger must leave the safety of its birthplace to find a new home?
A new, long-term study from Maharashtra’s Eastern Vidarbha Landscape (EVL) offers rare insights into that journey. By tracking young tigers as they leave their natal territories, disperse through risky terrain, and finally settle down, researchers have mapped how the big cats adapt to, and struggle with, living alongside people. “We deliberately chose subadult tigers of 1.5-2.5 years, which were on the cusp of leaving their mother’s territory. By following them across three stages — pre-dispersal, dispersal, and post-dispersal — we could capture their full journey, from comfort zone to independence,” says Pallavi Ghaskadbi, a wildlife biologist and postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Wildlife, Fish and Environmental Studies, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU), Umeå, and one of the study’s researchers.
In search of new homes
The East Vidarbha Landscape or EVL, part of the central Indian tiger landscape, is a patchwork of reserves, sanctuaries, and forest divisions interspersed with agricultural fields, highways, and more than 8,500 villages. Its forested areas include the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve, Umred-Karhandla Wildlife Sanctuary, and Tipeshwar Wildlife Sanctuary.
“The EVL makes up about 30% of Maharashtra’s area and is home to 20% of its people; yet it also supports an estimated 300-500 tigers. That makes it the perfect place to understand how tigers navigate human-dominated landscapes, how they adapt, and where the risks of conflict are the highest,” says Ghaskadbi.
Between 2016 and 2022, researchers fitted 15 subadult tigers (across different ages) with GPS collars that logged their location every few hours. Ten (eight males and two females) were collared inside protected areas and five (one male and four females) outside. Collaring involved safe anaesthesia, padded collars to allow for growth, and a remote drop-off removal once new territories were established.
The study brought emotional challenges, as tracking tigers in real time meant witnessing them confront the harshest realities of life in human-dominated landscapes. “Some animals we collared died from electrocution on illegally wired farms. As scientists, our role was to report these deaths objectively, even when our instinct was to intervene. Convincing ourselves, and sometimes people who love tigers, that we couldn’t rescue a radio-collared tiger from the risks it faced was hard,” says Ghaskadbi.
To make sense of the data points, the team used Hidden Markov Models (HMMs), a statistical method that classifies behaviour into states such as resting, travelling, or foraging. They also factored in time of day, temperature, habitat, human density, and proximity to roads.
Coming of age
The study found that, like humans, tigers pass through various life stages that shape their behaviour.
In their earliest phase, young tigers stayed within their natal ranges, close to their mothers’ territories. The study tracked six males and four females for 15 to 154 days, collecting data from 9,420 GPS locations. On average, the tigers spent about 30% of their time travelling, 42% lingering in small areas, and 27% resting. Patterns reflected caution and familiarity. They mostly rested during the day and travelled at night.
Even at this stage, they moved faster in human-dense areas, suggesting early risk awareness. “The pre-dispersal phase gave us a baseline. Then, as they began venturing out, often during the monsoon, when cover outside protected areas is thicker, we saw the first signs of exploratory behaviour,” says Ghaskadbi.
Leaving home to establish new territories or dispersal, was the riskiest phase. The study tracked six dispersing tigers (five males and one female) for 19 to 162 days, collecting 5,400 GPS points. On average, they split their time almost evenly: 32% resting, 36% lingering, and 32% travelling.
Patterns shifted with habitat. In forests, tigers slowed down, moving in shorter bursts. In farmlands, villages, and roads, they sped up and travelled in straighter lines to reduce risk. They also adjusted their timing: long-distance travel peaked at dusk and night, resting followed after midnight until dawn, and exploratory movements peaked around 10 a.m. “They relied on pockets of forest and safe corridors to make these dangerous journeys possible. Therefore, smaller unprotected forests or ‘wastelands’ are important for the survival of these big cats,” says Ghaskadbi.
Once young tigers established new territories, their movements became more stable. In this post-dispersal phase, the study tracked seven individuals (five males and two females) for 84 to 305 days, yielding 8,980 GPS points. By this stage, the tigers spent about 36% of their time resting, 39% lingering in smaller areas, and 25% travelling.
Here too, habitat shaped how they moved: in forests, tigers lingered and patrolled directionally and in non-forest areas, they travelled in longer, straighter stretches (sometimes twice the distance of forest movements) to minimise time in risky spaces. Daily patterns were also distinct: resting peaked early in the morning, exploratory movements dominated most of the day, and travel was the most common in the evening.
The study found that temperature also strongly influenced behaviour. Tigers were the most active at 20-30°C, but during Vidarbha’s scorching summers, when the heat touched 50°C, they rested more. “In the post-dispersal stage, especially, we saw them rest more as the heat climbed, which seems like a clear thermoregulatory adaptation,” says Ghaskadbi. Gender did not influence behaviour as much as life stage did; males and females showed similar patterns.
Need for a safe passage
The study showed that tigers actively change their pace and direction around people. “We usually think of leopards and cougars as the ‘adaptable big cats’ in human areas. But seeing tigers in high-density areas, and how they moved faster and in straighter lines, as if trying to get through quickly rather than linger, was fascinating. That kind of risk-avoidance strategy is exactly what allows them to survive in crowded landscapes,” says Ghaskadbi.
According to the researchers, this life-stage lens is a first for tigers. It shows that their behaviour isn’t static, it changes with age and context. That’s crucial for conservation, because it highlights when animals are the most vulnerable, why safe corridors matter, and how wildlife park managers can anticipate conflict hotspots.
Habitat fragmentation remains the biggest threat to tigers, especially since about 35% of India’s tigers live outside protected areas. “The clearest takeaway from our study is that tigers need connected landscapes. Protecting and restoring forest corridors between reserves is not just a long-term goal but essential for dispersing tigers right now. Without safe passage, they are forced closer to humans, villages and farmland, where the risks of electrocution, retaliation, or roadkill are high,” says Ghaskadbi.
The study also stresses that people must be central to coexistence. “Supporting those who live alongside tigers through compensation schemes, crop protection, maintenance of solar-powered fences, and livelihood programmes can reduce conflict and build trust. Our study shows that tigers are flexible and resilient, but it’s up to us to ensure the landscapes they move through are permeable and safe,” Ghaskadbi concludes.
Read more: The rise, fall, and return of India’s tigers
Banner image: A tigress and her cub in Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve. In their earliest phase prior to dispersal, young tigers stayed within their natal ranges, close to their mothers’ territories. Image by Rohit Sharma via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).
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