Bigcats News

[strana]

(03-09-2016, 08:10 PM)Dr Panthera Wrote: 2 great news for tiger conservation:

1-Malaysia has effectively banned Sambar hunting for six years making the 1000 Malaysian Sambars fully available for the 300-350 Malaysian tigers, wild boar is not normally hunted by Muslim hunters ( the majority of Malaysians ), muntjac is plentiful so the major tiger prey base looks secure which bodes well for tigers.

2-The remote Chittagong Hills forests in Bangladesh seem to have healthy populations of sambar, gaur, and wild boar and 13 cm wide foot prints ( of tigers ) have been discovered to suggest a tiger population of about 15 adults ( M.Khan ) which is significant since there are only 2500 adult tigers left in the wild, every single tiger counts.

Dr Panthera,
 I would like to be optimist about Malaysia but I am not. In my opinion, it is just a matter of time to someone declare that the malaysian tiger is extinct, at least in wild.
Do you remember Myanmar ( Burma ) ?? This country proudly said in 2010 that they had established the world´s largest tiger reserve : Hukawng Valley Tiger Reserve. However, the truth is that Myanmar did not make anything to protect the reserve and there are people who say that there is not a single tiger anymore overthere  !!!! It is still worse when I think that the tigers in Hukawng were very specials, similar in size to those from Assam.
The situation in Thailand seems to be better. In a recent study, where Dr Ullas Karanth also participated, the census showed that the tiger population is increasing. In Huai Khaeng Wildlife Sanctuary, for example, 90 individual tigers were observed and the population of both tigers and prey seems to be increasing. It is also very good that the so called " Tiger Temple"  looks to be under serious pressure from the authorities.
By the way there are 3 good news and 1 very bad from India:
- last january was remarkable in Nagarahole, with 12 ( !! ) new tiger cubs,
- 2 new tiger cubs were sighted in Panna, the total number of big cats is now 32;
- in the last census, Madhya Pradesh announced substantial increase in tiger numbers, with  89  more being counted since  last census in 2014. Now the state has 397 tigers. If this is true, I think it is incredibly news...89 more tigers in a little more than a year !!!! I strongly suspect that the census in 2014 was too pessimistic or the 2015 census is too optimistic.
The terrible news is that there are already 2 confirmed cases of poaching in Valmiki Tiger Reserve this year. I think that it is specially bad because Valmiki is contiguous to Chitwan, so it is natural to believe that the same problem might be happening in that famous nepalese reserve. However, at least a good number of poachers were arrested.
By the way, in Russia the prey base looks to be improving. Russian scientists want to reintroduce the Amur leopard in southern  Sikhote Alin, believing that there are enough food for tigers and leopards. They are making a  study about prey numbers right now. An excellent example of how much russians seems interested in protecting both tigers and leopards is that in this winter they have bought more than 300 tons of forage to serve as supplementary food for the ungulates and vaccinated more than 2000 wild boars against hog plague.
 If this tendency continues, I believe we are going to see the old good days of Amur tiger back, although I still believe that there are 250kg + individuals in the wild. In the 2015 census, for example, the scientist have found many very big pugs and filmed tigers who look  very big indeed. Reply