The Amur tiger has leapt into the headlines with former Russian president Vladimir Putin shooting a tiger with a tranquillizing gun in Russia’s far east, before tagging the tiger with a collar containing a satellite radio.
The Amur tiger has leapt into the headlines with former Russian
president Vladimir Putin shooting a tiger with a tranquillizing gun in
Russia’s far east, before tagging the tiger with a collar containing a
satellite radio.
Putin, now his country’s prime minister, was taken on a trip into the
Ussuriisk nature reserve near the Chinese border to see how researchers
monitor the tigers in the wild. He helped measure the tiger’s incisors
before placing the satellite transmitter around its neck.
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WWF-Russia, active in efforts to protect the Amur tiger for many years,
is delighted at the wide publicity the tiger has received.
“This was the same tigress I tracked in January 2004 in the same place
in Ussuriiskii,†said Dr.Yury Darman, Director of the Amur branch of
WWF Russia. “At that time the size of its heel was 10cm and it had a
brood of three tiger cubs.â€
The Amur tiger, which can weigh up to 450kg and measure around three
metres from its nose to the tip of its tail, has come back from the
brink of extinction to its highest population for at least 100 years.
Only about 40 were alive in 1950 but nowadays there are around 450, one of the strongest tiger populations in the world.
Although this is a healthy increase, it doesn’t translate to the Amur
tiger being out of danger. Poachers still target the animal for illegal
markets, particularly in nearby China. Hunters are also a threat, with
an illegal tiger trap being discovered on an adjacent hunting reserve
last year.
And, as Dr Darman explained, “wild boar population defines the
well-being of the Amur tigers, while the wild boar depends on a crop of
Korean Cedar pine nuts and Mongolian oak acornsâ€.
As president, Putin received pleas from WWF and local residents to halt
the destruction of Korean Cedar Pine forests, now encroaching on the
reserve to the extent that loggers destroyed a popular ecological
track.
Dr Darman said no state authority has real responsibility for the
implementation of the 1996 Conservation strategy of the Amur tiger in
Russia with basic financing still coming from international funds
“Vladimir Putin has heard all these issue from Andrey Kotlyar, the
director of Ussuriiskii nature reserve,†Dr Darman said. “Now we may
hope,that the problems which the WWF and nature reserve failed to solve
for many years will receive state resolution at last.â€