Tiger hunting

[5] Tigers were once considered to be harder to hunt than lions, due to their habit of living alone in dense cover and not noisily asserting their presence with roars as often.

Any of these involved considerable danger and the hunting of a tiger had been considered a manly and a courageous feat with game, trophies being collected as the symbols of valor and prestige.

[7] In some places such as China, tigers were also perceived to be a threat to human life in the area, so those who managed to kill them were hailed as heroes to the general public.

In 1986, it was discovered that tigers were declining rapidly due to being poisoned, snared or shot and then smuggled out of India to supply medicinal manufacturers in China.

[20] In the first years of the 20th century, the Imperial Russian government began a plan to colonise the Central Asiatic lands inhabited by the Caspian tiger.

The Russian local authorities worked heavily to exterminate tigers during a huge land reclamation program in areas such as the Syr-Daria and Amu-Daria rivers and the Aral Sea.

Due to intensive hunting and deforestation, the Caspian tiger retreated first from the lush lowlands to the forested ranges, then to the marshes around some of the larger rivers, and finally, deeper into the mountains, until it almost certainly became extinct.

In the early years of the Russian Civil War, both Red and White armies based in Vladivostok nearly wiped out the local Siberian tigers.

[21] In 1959, during the PRC's Great Leap Forward, Mao Zedong declared South China tigers as enemies of man, and began organizing and encouraging eradication campaigns.

When combined with the high prices that furs fetch on the black market and destruction of habitat, poaching for medicinal uses has greatly reduced tiger populations in the wild.

[23] As TCM practitioners push to remove endangered species from the "ingredients list," they are being met by farmers hoping to reignite the demand for TCM-based medicinal products, such as Tiger Bone Wine.

The main factors behind the endangerment of tigers are spurred by humans, due to demand, customary beliefs, ritual practices of/and increasing number of populations clashing and tampering with the original boundaries and dwelling zones of this wild animal.

In some middle eastern countries tiger parts are believed to heal the liver and kidneys and are used to treat epilepsy, baldness, inflammation, possession by evil demons, toothaches, malaria, hydrophobia, skin diseases, nightmares, laziness, fevers, and headaches.

The degree to which poaching and hunting is practised is such that very rarely do Siberian tigers die of old age, since they are killed before they are allowed to reach this stage.

In recognition of these times of struggle for the survival of the tiger, Russian Prime minister Vladimir Putin has put forth an effort to bring people together in awareness of this occurrence in the city of St. Petersburg.

Key landscapes must be tiger-conservation friendly to ensure ecosystem integrity that is equally valuable for humans, tigers and many other wildlife species sharing the same area.

[29][30][31][32][33][34] In July 2014 at an international convention on endangered species in Geneva, Switzerland, a Chinese representative admitted for the first time his government was aware trading in tiger skins was occurring in China.

In an attempt to rid its paws of the sticky fluid with its tongue or teeth, the tiger would involuntarily cover its face with dirt and leaves.

[6] In Madhya Pradesh, the Baigas would hang a tiger's kill from the middle of a horizontal pole supported in two forked trees a few feet apart.

Because the pole was slippery and had no bark, the tiger would slip, trying to gain access to the kill and fall upon sharpened bamboo spikes at the bottom.

[6] For this purpose it was necessary to have a pack of hunting dogs of very considerable strength, well trained in the chase of every kind of big game animal found in the taiga.

Upon encountering the tiger, the dogs would begin to bark furiously, at the same time catching hold of its legs and biting it in the hind quarters.

When the tiger was finally cornered, the dogs would usually make high pitched barks, consistent with feelings of extreme nervousness.

Human scarcity makes for less exploitation of natural resources and the wild tiger populations can in these places remain stable or increase, as long as they are not subject to poaching.

The loss of vegetative elements in their reproductive and dwelling environment is a cause for concern as well, since these species rely on cover from trees and tall grasses to prey on other animals.

Gratwicke et al. 2006 writes that ExxonMobil, a major corporation has invested 12.6 million US dollars for the sole purpose of tiger conservation between the years of 1999–2004.

The Wildlife Conservation Society and the Panthera Foundation announced a plan in 2008 to create a "Genetic Corridor" between Bhutan and Myanmar to help sustain a large, continuous population of tigers, spanning eight countries.

This project promises to be the largest area of unbroken or unfragmented tiger habitat, and would represent the single most intense effort to conserve this species from extinction.

Sanderson et al. (2006) evaluated the effectiveness of varying conservation measures for the tiger species in differing sites through a survey of 70 conservationists.