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Bigcats News
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A disturbing two-minute video from Uttar Pradesh's Pilibhit district shows an adult tigress being beaten to death with sticks by villagers this week.
The village is close to the Pilibhit Tiger Reserve, about 240 km from state capital Lucknow. The mobile video, shot by a resident of the Mataina village on Thursday afternoon, captures the assault by the villagers and even has a background commentary by a witness who says they are assaulting the tigress because she had attacked and injured a villager in the morning. https://www.ndtv.com/video/environment/n...ary-522610 
I am not one bit surprised by that news, sadly. The man-animal conflict is India’s challenge in wildlife conservation, especially in areas where wildlife has spilled out of the reserves, Pilibhit being a definite example.
https://m.timesofindia.com/city/bareilly/pilibhits-cane-fields-have-more-tigers-than-20-of-countrys-50-tiger-reserves/articleshow/70119539.cms 
5 have been arrested so far apparently with more to come.
What comes of these arrests is a completely different story. 
I saw this all over social media yesterday, it was by far the most horrific thing i have ever witnessed. horrible, these people need to be arrested and punished.
To commemorate World Tiger Day on Monday, 29th July, the Indian environment minister will reveal the results of 2018 tiger census. From a little bit of information I have, the numbers are decent and very much on track for the 2x by 2022 model. Sure could use some good news.
https://www.news18.com/news/india/royal-bengal-tiger-spotted-via-camera-traps-set-up-by-wwf-in-north-sikkim-for-high-altitude-conservation-project-2248385.html
Since November 2018, we have had multiple sightings of the royal Bengal tiger here in Sikkim, which helps to confirm that the state is a thriving circuit for these big cats.” The animal tends to take a circuit beginning in West Bengal, with the route passing through dense forests bordering Bhutan and Sikkim and reaching beyond the tri-junction area. Apart from the royal Bengal tiger, the camera traps are said to have captured snow leopards as well, surprisingly at an altitude that is lower than their natural habitat. According to the forest department, this could have been due to an increase in snowfall over the winters as well as due to other herbivores shifting further downhill. The department said other herbivores were not being hampered by the presence of these big cats and also denied an animal-human conflict. https://images.app.goo.gl/XGihHkYTMkAavKx7A 
Tiger got beaten to death by the Indian villagers. Any specific information about that tiger individual?
@Ashutosh Is the "Status of tigers, copredators & prey in India 2018-19" out yet?
Prime Minister announced that the tiger population in the country had risen by 700, PIB official statement: But i can't find the report... While the number 3000 was floating around from mid-2018, i'm more interested in stats & maps.
THE LATEST TIGER COUNT: 2967
The report says there is an increase of 741 tigers from the previous census. This figure does not include cubs, sub-adults or juveniles under their mother’s care. https://www.deccanherald.com/national/india-home-to-2967-tigers-33-jump-from-last-count-750387.html The 40 page report is on the webpage.  (07-28-2019, 12:11 AM)GrizzlyClaws Wrote: Tiger got beaten to death by the Indian villagers. Any specific information about that tiger individual?This tigress has attacked villagers, vilagers reported this incident to forest guard .. but delay in response.. villagers took the mater on their hand... few are arrested She is from pilibhit very close to dudhawa
For anyone who is interested in the 40 page report on methodology and tiger census of India 2018:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GfTZ6Qnrm4W3VXsXKvaE3qWZ5_-UFqEN/view
Forward from (https://wildfact.com/forum/topic-tigers-...1#pid88981), I have noticed something about the fossils discovered in the Philippine island of Palawan, which might affect the issue of whether or not the tiger was there, even if to a minor degree. Firstly, let's start with a description of Palawan, before talking about what I noticed about the fossils.
Palawan is that narrow yet noticeably sized island in the southwest of the Philippines, near the Greater Sunda Island of Borneo: https://www.flickr.com/photos/tamaratiu/5854493319, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Greater_sunda_islands.png  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author Image of Palawan by Lonely Planet: https://www.lonelyplanet.com/philippines/palawan  *This image is copyright of its original author Puerto-Princesa Subterranean River National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site: https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/652/  *This image is copyright of its original author Not only is Palawan close to Borneo, they are thought to have been connected in prehistoric times, judging from the molecular phylogeny of rodents of the family Muridae (including house mice and Old World rats), though there is no geographical evidence to support this, so it could be that their masses were greater in those times, which meant that the Balabac Strait between them was narrow enough for tigers to swim from Borneo to Palawan: https://books.google.com/books?id=JmSsNuwMAxgC&pg=PT219&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=palawan&f=false, http://macrocosm-magbook.blogspot.com/2008/07/more-evidence-of-ancient-tigers-in.html, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0031018208002113?via%3Dihub  *This image is copyright of its original author The fossils are two articulated phalanx bones, possibly from the same toe, besides a distal segment of a basal phalanx (ICWM-2376) of the 4th or 5th digit of the manus or pes, which were excavated amidst an assemblage of other animal bones and stone tools in Ille Cave near the village of New Ibajay in the province of El Nido, in the northern part of Palawan. One bone (IV-1998-P-38239) was a full basal phalanx of the second digit of the left manus, and the other (IV-1998-P-38238) was the distal portion of a subterminal phalanx of the same digit and manus. With the former bone having a greatest length of 46.44 mm (1.828 inches), and the latter having a medio-lateral width of the distal end of 16.04 mm (0.631 inches), for example, their measurements were similar to those of Malayan and Indian tigers. The other fossils were identified as being of long-tailed macaques, deer, bearded pigs, small mammals, lizards, snakes and turtles: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0031018208002113?via%3Dihub *This image is copyright of its original author Ille Cave, north Palawan: https://pia-journal.co.uk/articles/10.5334/pia.308/  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author A potential prey of the tiger, the Palawan bearded pig (Sus ahoenobarbus), a different species to the Bornean bearded pig (Sus barbatus): https://www.zoochat.com/community/media/...us.177240/  *This image is copyright of its original author Scenario 1: The tiger subfossils were imported from elsewhere From the stone tools, besides the evidence for cuts on the bones, and the use of fire, it would appear that early humans had accumulated the bones. Additionally, the condition of the tiger subfossils, dated to approximately 12,000 to 9,000 years ago, differed from other fossils in the assemblage, dated to the Upper Paleolithic. The tiger subfossils showed longitudinal fracture of the cortical bone due to weathering, which suggests that they had post-mortem been exposed to light and air. Tiger parts were commonly used as amulets in South and Southeast Asia, so it may be that the tiger parts were imported from elsewhere, as is the case with tiger canine teeth which were found in Ambangan sites dating to the 10th to 12th centuries in Butuan, Mindanao: https://books.google.com/books?id=JmSsNuwMAxgC&pg=PT219&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=tiger&f=false, https://books.google.com/books?id=e-hyDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA80&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=tiger&f=false Scenario 2: The tiger migrated to Palawan from elsewhere On the other hand, the proximity of Borneo and Palawan also makes it likely that the tiger had colonized Palawan from Borneo in the Middle Pleistocene, about 420,000 – 620,000 years ago, during periods in which relative sea levels decreased to their lowest, at circa −130 m (−430 ft), by the expansion of ice sheets. Considering the ability of tigers to swim, it is possible that the tiger crossed the Balabac Strait when the distance between the islands of Borneo and Palawan was much less than today, during the Middle and Late Pleistocene, before the Last Glacial Maximum circa 18,000 years ago: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0031018208002113?via%3Dihub, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/223800396_Palaeoenvironments_of_insular_Southeast_Asia_during_the_Last_Glacial_Period_A_savanna_corridor_in_Sundaland, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0277379101001019?via%3Dihub, https://www.nature.com/articles/nature03975 Piper et al.: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0031018208002113?via%3Dihub *This image is copyright of its original author 12 non-volant mammals in Palawan have close relatives in other islands of the Sunda Shelf, including Borneo. Thus the Palawan is considered to be the northeastern part of the biogeographic region of the Sunda Islands. It is believed that Palawan had a landmass of approximately 100,000 km² (39,000 miles²), when the sea was 120 metres (390 feet) lower than at current levels during the Last Glacial Maximum, and that the climate was dry and cool compared to now, with open woodland mostly constituting the vegetation, except perhaps for a few savannahs. Palawan was inhabited by a number of arboreal and terrestrial animals, such as pigs and deer, as indicated by an archaeozoological study of Ille Cave: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0031018208002113?via%3Dihub, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/255591467_The_mammals_of_Palawan_Island_Philippines, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2FBF00142213 At the end of the Pleistocene, the Balabac Strait widened due to the amelioration of the climate and subsequent rise of the sea level. The widening of the strait would have isolated the Palawan tigers and narrowed their available territory. The rise in sea level was such that almost 90% of Palawan got inundated, and its total landmass reduced to less than 12,000 km² (4,600 miles²), by around 5,000 years ago. Moreover, in the early Holocene, closed canopy rainforest would have replaced the open seasonal woodland and savannah. As indicated by the Terminal Pleistocene archaeozoological record from Ille Cave, climatic and environmental change, besides predation by humans, put pressure populations of deer, which were likely important resources for the tiger. The number of deer thus declined after 5,000 years ago, and before the start of historical records. To put it simply, a significant decrease in habitat and food resources, isolation from other populations by increasing sea levels, and possibly hunting by humans likely caused the extinction of the Palawan tiger population, just as these or similar factors threaten existing populations of tigers. To date, no evidence exists for the tiger surviving in Palawan beyond 12,000 years ago: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0031018208002113?via%3Dihub, https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0277379105001617?via%3Dihub, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2FBF00142213 As mentioned by The Philippine Business and News, if the tiger wasn't native to Borneo or Palawan, then why would natives there use foreign animals for their rituals? https://thephilbiznews.com/2019/07/05/environment-feature-sumatra-tigers-in-palawan/ As it is, the case of the 2 Palawanese tiger toe-bones being found in Ille Cave amongst the fossils of other animals, which were likely collected by humans, somewhat resembles the case of 9 claws or toe bones of Upper Pleistocene Eurasian cave lions (Panthera spelaea or Panthera leo spelaea) from roughly the same period (the Upper Paleolithic or Pleistocene, around 16,000 years ago), which were found in La Garma Cave in Spain, amongst the fossils of other animals, including horses and goats, and were likely to have been used by early humans for rituals, and it is not like cave lions did not occur in the Iberian Peninsula: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/27/science/cave-lion-pelts-caverns.html The area within the La Garma cave system where the cave lion claws were found, credit: Pedro Saura  *This image is copyright of its original author 8 of the 9 cave lion toe bones found in the Upper Paleolithic cave site, credit: Marian Cueto  *This image is copyright of its original author
Forward from (https://wildfact.com/forum/topic-arabian...0#pid89070), in a boost to Saudi Arabia's bid to save the Arabian leopard, 2 cubs have been born at Prince Saud Al-Faisal Wildlife Research Center in Ta'if, located east of Mecca in the mountainous region of the Hijaz, which is part of the west Arabian mountainous region of the Sarawat, where the leopard would naturally occur: http://www.arabnews.com/node/1533636/saudi-arabia, http://www.yemenileopard.org/files/cms/r...eopard.pdf
Arab News:  *This image is copyright of its original author  *This image is copyright of its original author "AL-ULA: The birth of two Arabian leopard cubs has been hailed as a “new beacon of hope” in Saudia Arabia’s bid to reintroduce the critically endangered big cat back into the wild. The Saudi Royal Commission for AlUla (RCU) revealed that the male and female cubs, born on April 26 at the Prince Saud Al-Faisal Wildlife Research Center in Taif, had now been vaccinated after passing a crucial 12-week developmental milestone. The news marks a significant step in the RCU’s breeding program to help preserve and eventually reintroduce the subspecies into the north-west of the Kingdom as part of its portfolio of Arabian Leopard Initiatives (ALI). The commission’s charter aims to deliver a sensitive and responsible transformation of the AlUla region and protect its nature and wildlife. During the initial 12-week period of the newborn leopards’ lives, they successfully bonded with their 10-year-old mother Hamms (which means “whisper” in Arabic), learned important behaviors and grew stronger in the seclusion of their den. The cubs will remain with their mother for the next 18 months to two years in line with global best practice for captive breeding programs. Saudi Minister of Culture and RCU Gov. Prince Badr bin Abdullah bin Farhan Al-Saud, said: “This is a historic moment in our efforts to reintroduce the Arabian leopard to the AlUla region. “With fewer than an estimated 200 Arabian leopards remaining in the wild globally, this is one of the most critically endangered animals in the world, and these cubs represent a new beacon of hope for the renewal of a subspecies on the brink of extinction. It is our duty to protect, conserve and build population numbers to preserve the species from becoming a footnote of history. “That is why the RCU is actively championing the revitalization of the Arabian leopard to support the future of this rare and majestic big cat that is native to AlUla,” the prince added. “The birth of these two cubs will be the first of many as our specialized captive breeding program grows and develops – boosted by the support of local experts, as well as global partners like Panthera.” The commission’s ALI combines several projects working toward the preservation of the subspecies including an extensive captive breeding and reintroduction program, and the establishment of the Global Fund for the Arabian Leopard. As a center of excellence, the RCU is establishing a steering committee with leading experts from around the world to enhance and inform ALI’s captive breeding, husbandry, veterinary and reintroduction practices in the existing breeding facility located in Taif. The committee will also help guide the design of a state-of-the-art breeding center to be constructed in AlUla county and consult on habitat revitalization projects in the Sharaan Nature Reserve. It was announced in February that the newly created Global Fund for the Arabian Leopard will have an initial endowment of $25 million (SR94 million), making it the largest fund in the world wholly dedicated to safeguarding the Arabian leopard. Currently in the strategic planning and operational set-up phase, the fund will be fully mobilized by the end of this year. The news of the leopard cubs’ birth follows the signing in June of a partnership agreement between the RCU governor and Dr. Thomas Kaplan, chairman of the global wild cat conservation organization Panthera. Saudi Arabia, through this partnership, has in turn joined the Global Alliance for Wild Cats, making a commitment to invest $20 million over the next 10 years."
Brutal yet moving, when tourists in Madikwe Game Reserve in South Africa saw a lioness feeding on a hartebeest, they expected it to keep on doing what it was doing, but they were in for a surprise: the lioness showed remorse after realising that it killed a pregnant antelope: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article...elope.html
 *This image is copyright of its original author
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