The Tiger

This is a little-known tiger subspecies which I've recently written about. I focused on the extinction of this tiger . Back in the day, at the beginning of the 20th century, tigers were considered to be pests and nuisances. Bloodthirsty Europeans who were well-healed made their way to Asia to take pot shots at tigers including those on the island of Bali.  Bali tiger. It is said that they tied baits like goats to posts and under or around the goat they placed a leg trap. The tiger approached the goat and was trapped in the jaws of this clamp whereupon the great White Hunter shot the tiger at point blank range. They then went home and tell their wives and children what wonderful hunters they were. It is all very sad. In addition to being hunted to extinction probably before the 1950s, the Bali tiger was also pushed off their own land by human population growth and expanding human activities including plantations which destroyed their habitat. And humans have an insatiable appetite f...

I have said that the South China tiger subspecies ( Panthera tigris amoyensis ) is totally extinct - captive or wild . That may be a rash statement but it is based on sensible thought and real information. As at 2002, on the publication of the Sunquist's renown Wild Cats Of The World , of the five-remaining subspecies of the tiger (I say it's four now) the South China tiger was the most endangered. Tiger farm - Photo by International Tiger Coalition The decline in population was rapid at the end. In 1949 it was thought that there were 4,000 individuals. However, this fantastic animal was "declared a pest" and mercilessly persecuted. I can understand one aspect of this. The tiger is hard to live with because it is a very large and a potentially dangerous animal. Humankind has great difficulty sharing the planet with it. But the main reason for its decline is Chinese medicine. Please note that I am not being judgemental. I am simply describing what has gone o...

What caused the extinction of the Javan tiger? It is really a story about the usual culprit - humans. In the 1800s tigers were widespread in Java. The forests of Java were the tiger's habitat. The forests were "converted to teak" (1). So the tiger's habitat was despoiled by people. The lost of tiger habitat forced the Javan tiger to find sanctuary in inaccessible places on the island. By the 1970 the tiger lived on the southeast coast of Java on the Meru-Betiri Reserve. The reserve was not good tiger habitat. Deer, the prey of tigers, was hunted. Hunting of deer in combination with rapid human population growth lead to a rapidly declining deer population. By the 1950s deer could only be found outside reserves or sanctuaries. And these places were few in number. Another prime tiger prey, the wild boar was slaughtered under government directive by poisoning.  The only abundant prey for the tiger was primates with very low boar numbers. Javan tigers at this tim...

Why did the Caspian tiger become extinct? Uhmm, we really only have to look at what is going on today. But how, specifically, did we lose the Caspian tiger? The Caspian tiger did not populate the area densely but in and around water courses and where there was water. The range of the Caspian tiger was approximately that of its prime prey the cervids, examples of which are red and roe deer and the wild boar. Caspian tiger. Photo: Wikipedia. He looks overweight due to his captivity. He looks very heavy. The DNA of the Caspian tiger is very close to that of the Siberian tiger apparently. The beginning of the end for this tiger was the occupation of the region by Russians. The Russians cultivated the reedbeds to agricultural land (growing cotton), thereby despoiling the tiger's habitat and hunted the tiger and its prey, the wild boar, that helped to support the tiger. Colonisation of the area was facilitated by the river systems. The tiger was then made vulnerable to the activities o...

I have mentioned them in the introduction. Their scientific names are as below. The links go to pages on the individual subspecies: Panthera tigris ssp. altaica - Siberian or Amur tiger - see Siberian tiger habitat Panthera tigris ssp. amoyensis - South China tiger Panthera tigris ssp. balica - Bali Tiger Panthera tigris ssp.corbetti - Indochinese Tiger Panthera tigris ssp. jacksoni (after Peter Jackson) (Malaysia calls the tiger: Panthera tigris malayensis after the region) - Malayan tiger Panthera tigris ssp. sondaica - Javan tiger - the most recent tiger subspecies to become extinct. People still claim to see it but are they getting mixed up with the leopard? This tiger is small. It is still feared. And if it still exists it is very unlikely to survive. Panthera tigris ssp. sumatrae - Sumatran tiger - the differences in this tiger in respect of DNA and morphology are such that it has been proposed that it should be a distinct species 1 . Panthera tigris ssp. tigri...