Talk:Ghira Belladonna/@comment-31589220-20181218111228/@comment-24018437-20181225211247

@73.Anon.52 No citation is needed. All black panthers that roam the Indian wilderniss are melanistic leopards. As I stated several times before, black panthers aren't a seperate species and in the usual context the word is used, it usually refers to a melanistic leopard or jaguar. There are no jaguars in India. And the only leopard subspecies that would live in the Indian forests would be the Indian leopard. And while Bagheera himself was born in captivity, his mother was said to have been born in the jungle and told him stories about the place she came from.

Really, no citation is needed as there is literally no possible way of saying Bagheera is anything else but a melanistic Indian leopard. Its the same as claiming that Shere Khan is a Siberian or Sumatran tiger. Sure, the books never claims he's a Bengal tiger specificly. But considering no other tiger subspecies roams India, it would be VERY unlikely if he was somehow a Siberian, Sumatran or Indochinese tiger.

The same can be said from the wolves. The wolves in the books were Indian wolves. Sure, the book never states they are that specific subspecies. But the chanche that they are American timberwolves, arctic wolves, Himalyan or Middle-Eastern wolves is VERY small. The only animal in the books that can be a scource of confusion could be Baloo, as Kipling described him as a Himalyan brown bear, even though those don't live in the Indian jungle, and his behavior is much more akin to that of a sun bear or white-chested bear.

So yeah. The chanche of Bagheera being anything else but a melanistic Indian leopard is pretty much non-existent and some really streched fan-theories would be needed to justify him being anything else. Claiming he is anything else but that would be like saying Simba is an Asiatic lion, rather then an African one, even though the story takes place in Africa. After all, the movie never states they belong to the African subspecies. But it just makes sense for them to be that. Therefore, no citation is really needed.

@D Shadow208 Huh. Is that canon, the interactions between Tukson and Ghira? Or are they fan-comics? I have yet to read the manga.