ON THE EDGE OF EXTINCTION - A - THE TIGER (Panthera tigris)

[GuateGojira]

This is also interesting to know, thank you Tigerluver.

Now, I have not read the full document yet, but from the news articles and a few lines that I have read, I think that although they recognize only two "subspecies", they also propose three conservation units, separating the Amur-Caspian tigers from the southern Asian population, based in the fact that they are more than 1,000 km from the nearest population. I think this is correct, as the population of the Amur-Caspian tigers separated from the other mainland tigers about 12,000 - 15,000 years ago, about the same tiger than Bengal tigers, but at difference than this last one, they don't sustain any genetic interchange until about 2,000 years ago, when the Amur tigers invaded Manchuria and they contacted again with the South China tiger population. I insist, if you see the skulls of the Amur tigers, they look very different from other mainland populations, but if you see those of the Bengal, which sustained constant interchange with all the other southern tigers, they look very similar with not much differences.

In this case, Amur tigers will be managed separately, Sumatran tigers also follow the same way. while all southern Asian tigers (Bengal, Indochina, South China and Malaysia) were managed as a single population. Here are the images from the document itself:

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

The problem are the South China and Indochina tigers, which captive populations are very small with less than 100 specimens between the two, while the wild population of Indochinese tiger is probably less than 1,200 specimens (South China tigers are extinct in the wild). This new document suggest reintroduction of genes, in this case, Indochinese genes to the captive South China tigers (specially those from South Africa, as they are already wild and are a viable population, but they will surely need more genetic variation to they pool), or Bengal genes to the Indochinese captive population. Previously, all south Asian tigers, from India, Indochina, South China and Malaysia were considered P. t. tigris, and this paper suggest the same (I think).

By the way, check this new paper on the genetic of Indian tigers, from July 2015 (pretty new too): Demographic loss, genetic structure and the conservation implications for Indian tigers.

Full paper: http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/c...6.full.pdf

I think we have enough material to read and to discuss, which is excellent. [img]images/smilies/tongue.gif[/img]
  Reply