I love tigers. I have always been fascinated by the largest of all cats. Tigers are on the very edge of extinction. With only 5,000 – 7,000 remaining tigers in the wild around the world, the species is forced to live in increasingly fragmented forests and shrinking land areas from India to southeastern China and from far eastern Russia to Sumatra, Indonesia. Tigers in the wild exist in 40 percent less habitat than was thought a decade ago and now occupy only seven percent of their historic range.
What an awful world this will be if we let these magnificent be wiped off the face of the earth (and we are almost at that point!).
Here is what the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) has to say about the plight of tigers:
* An astounding 95 per cent of tigers have been wiped off the face of the earth through a combination of habitat loss and hunting.
* The estimated 5,000 remaining tigers in the world are among the most endangered of all species.
* Once, there were eight tiger subspecies – but by 1980, the Caspian, Javan and Bali tigers had been hunted to extinction.
* Today, five tiger subspecies remain – the Bengal, Siberian, Sumatran, Indochinese and South China tigers. However, it is estimated that there are only 20 South China tigers left in the world, and that species may also soon become extinct.
* There has been an upsurge of tiger killings recently in India, where most of the world’s remaining tigers live. A recent investigation revealed that tiger products are being marketed on the Internet.
* The greatest threat to tigers continues to be the international illegal trade in tiger parts (mostly used in traditional Chinese medicine) and products.
* In the late 1990s, the price paid to a hunter by a trader for one kilogram of tiger bone ranged from $15 to $160.
* Climate change is having a deadly effect on the Siberian tigers of Russia. Last winter was so cold and icy that tigers could not approach their prey noiselessly. Unable to feed themselves, many tigers and their cubs starved to death.
The Good News:
* There is hope – WWF has been working to save tigers since the launch of Operation Tiger in the early 1970s. Since then, the Bengal tiger population has nearly doubled. The Siberian tiger has recovered from fewer than 40 in the 1940s to more than 350 in 2002.
* WWF’s goal for 2010 is to eliminate the illegal hunting of tigers and the international black-market trade in tiger parts and products, and to protect well-managed habitat areas across the tiger’s entire natural range.
A few years ago my family got me a great birthday present. They adopted a tiger from the WWF in my name. I really love the idea behind this gift and keep the stuffed tiger I got as part of the package as a reminder to what is happening to tigers.
* You can find out more from the World Wildlife Fund Canada website: http://wwf.ca/index.cfm.
* You can Adopt a Tiger of your own or for someone you love: https://wwfstore.donorportal.ca/p-68-a-tiger.aspx
* Or you can Give a Tiger a Fighting Chance: http://wwf.ca/donate/uniquegifts/tiger/
“When a man wants to murder a tiger he calls it sport: when the tiger wants to murder him he calls it ferocity.”
- George Bernard Shaw
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