Eyes on or hands on? A discussion of human interference

[GuateGojira]

There is no issue on the tiger health, the risks are minimum now and the modern methods to work with the sedate specimens are safer than in past days (remember the Curve of learning).
 
You are ignoring the fact that the knowledge about the need of tigers in habitat matters came from radiocollaring studies. In fact, tigers don’t need unmolested areas as much as we think. Corbett, Dr Sunquist and Dr Karanth had found several cases of tigers living very near human settlements without conflict, showing that despite human presence (which is inevitable in the present), tigers manage to have normal lives. Conflict arises, of course, but as long as tiger prey is at good level and human retreat from forest areas, tigers will not attack cattle and by extension, humans. Of course, this don't include the destruction (in a industrial way) of the habitat, which is a completely different issue.
 
Finally, we don’t know where tigers exist by sure. We can infer trough signals and habitat quality, but often, this doesn’t show the full detail. Check for example the huge forests of Cambodia, we can say that there are tigers in the area, but at the end, we have no evidence and most of scientists believe that the population in that area is now at the brink of extinction.
 
In this case, we need the use of camera traps to corroborate the presence of tigers and this is the correct use of this tool. After we can corroborate that there are tigers in the place, the next step is to radiocollar a few specimens in order to monitor they social life and ecological needs. This is the logic way and the normal patter in Science.
  Reply