Monkey Outsmarts Tiger on Camera, Sends Predator Crashing to the Ground
A stalking tiger was only feet away from a monkey when its hunt fell apart in humiliating fashion, leaving the beast dazed and in the dust.
Best of all, the primate’s crafty escape was captured on video.
The encounter took place during a safari at India’s Periyar National Park and Wildlife Sanctuary.
In the clip, a tiger is seen making its way up a tree as a monkey sits in the higher branches. As the predator slinks closer, the monkey can only retreat towards the end of its branch.
Eventually, the primate was left clinging to the furthest edge of the tree as the big cat closed the distance.
Then, the hunt completely collapsed.
The lightweight monkey jumped away from the end of the branch, nimbly circling his way back to the tree’s main trunk. The tiger, awkward and confused so high up in a tree, fell to the ground after a short panic.
Although it wasn’t that great of a fall, the tiger was still given a painful lesson about going after prey in its own element.
[firefly_poll]
With the tiger stunned in the dust, it completely lost focus on its former quarry.
It’s unclear what the monkey did with the sudden reversal of fate, but the tiger’s dazed state would have likely made for an easy escape across the treetops.
The video was recorded by Dr. Roy Kallivayalil, who uploaded his find to Twitter.
Periyar #Tiger Reserve
Thekkady, #Kerala.
Who is the winner? pic.twitter.com/NehfJKyXnr— Dr Roy Kallivayalil (@RoyKallivayalil) January 2, 2021
In the video, the monkey appears to know exactly what he’s doing by luring the tiger out beyond limbs that could support the predator’s weight.
The tiger would have doubtlessly turned his arboreal prey into lunch if he had ever been able to close the distance.
Thankfully for the monkey, this tiger proved to be an amateur tree climber.
Tigers have been known to kill large animals including humans, and are even powerful enough to kill members of their own species with razor-sharp claws and teeth.
While the fate of the monkey in this footage is unknown, if half the tigers in Periyar are as clumsy as this one, our crafty primate hero should live to a ripe old age and die of natural causes.
This article appeared originally on The Western Journal.
