logo

Welcome


AboutZoos, Since 2008





201022Dec23:32

Cap­tiv­ity endan­gers tigers

Infor­ma­tion
pub­lished 22 Decem­ber 2010 | mod­i­fied 23 Decem­ber 2011
Archived

The year 2010 will be cel­e­brated as the Year of the Tiger by many Asian coun­tries, begin­ning Feb­ru­ary 14. An excel­lent oppor­tu­nity to report that tigers are in cri­sis around the world, so thought World Wildlife Fund (WWF). This includes the tigers kept in cap­tiv­ity, and not those which are kept in zoos. In many of the United States of Amer­ica there are no con­trols on indi­vid­u­als keep­ing tigers as pets. Cur­rent esti­mates indi­cate that there are more than 5,000 tigers in cap­tiv­ity in the United States. This exceeds the 3,200 tigers that still exist in the wild through­out Asia, where they are threat­ened by poach­ing, habi­tat loss, ille­gal traf­fick­ing and the con­ver­sion of forests for infra­struc­ture and plan­ta­tions. (Source: WWF)

Tiger pop­u­la­tion has decreased by about 95 per­cent since 1900 and its range has decreased by 93 per­cent. Three tiger sub-​species have gone extinct since the 1940s and a fourth one, the South China tiger, has not been seen in the wild in 25 years. Tigers occupy just seven per­cent of their his­toric range. But they can thrive if they have strong pro­tec­tion from poach­ing and habi­tat loss and enough prey to eat.

A reg­is­tra­tion scheme for all cap­tive tigers and a means to mon­i­tor dis­posal of dead tigers is urgently needed to ensure they aren’t exploited for the ille­gal trade. WWF is releas­ing a new inter­ac­tive map of the world’s top 10 tiger trou­ble spots and the main threats against tigers. WWF is also launch­ing a cam­paign: Tx2: Dou­ble or Noth­ing to sup­port tiger range states in their goal of dou­bling wild tiger num­bers by the next Year of the Tiger in 2022.

The real trou­ble spots regard­ing tiger endan­gere­ment can be found here.

UN Biodiversity decade
WWF Stop Wildlife Crime
Fight for Flight campaign
End Ivory-funded Terrorism
Support Rewilding Europe
NASA State of Flux

Goal: 7000 tigers in the wild

Tiger range countries map

Tiger map” (CC BY 2.5) by Sander­son et al., 2006.

about zoos and their mis­sion regard­ing breed­ing endan­gered species, nature con­ser­va­tion, bio­di­ver­sity and edu­ca­tion, which of course relates to the evo­lu­tion of species.
Fol­low me on: