Year of the Tiger (II)
Tigers are the "king of the hundred beasts" in people's hearts, which is not only reflected in the "king mark" on their foreheads, but also in the important role they play in the ecosystem as a top carnivore.
For thousands of years, our Chinese nation has been accompanied by tigers. General Secretary Xi Jinping said at the 2022 Spring Festival group meeting"
The tiger is a symbol of strength, bravery and fearlessness. In the Year of the Tiger, we must continue to write a new chapter in the history of the great cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics with the majestic spirit of the tiger and the mighty wind, the vigor of the dragon and the tiger, and the spirit of swallowing all the miles like a tiger!
”
In "The Year of the Tiger Says Tiger (I)", we learned about the "past life" of the tiger, and today we will talk about the "present life" of the tiger.
tiger
target
kiss
margin
After a long history, as one of the members of the leopard genus, the tiger has only 4 cousins, namely lion, leopard, snow leopard and jaguar.
Tigers and snow leopards were the first to separate from other leopard families, and they may be more closely related than other members.
Swipe left and right to see the animals that are closest to the tiger
(From left to right: lion, jaguar, leopard, snow leopard)
It turns out that the snow leopard is the closest bloodline to the tiger, and the "big cat" with the word "leopard" in the name of the cheetah and the clouded leopard do not belong to the leopard genus, and the relationship with the tiger is even more distant.
clan
A vein
According to the oldest tiger fossils, tigers were widely distributed in East Asia about 2 million years ago.
From ancient times to the present, it is difficult to determine how many tiger subspecies have appeared in the world. At present, it is generally believed that modern tigers are divided into 9 subspecies, of which 3 have been extinct, all distributed in Asia.
1 Siberian tigers
The largest surviving tiger has dark brown stripes and sparse stripes, and its abdomen is white, and its fur is plump and soft to withstand the harsh climate. Mainly distributed in Russia and northeast China, as of 2015, the number of Siberian tigers in the Russian Far East is around 500, and the mainland is estimated to have more than 30.
2 South China Tiger
Also known as the "Chinese tiger", it is a subspecies of tiger endemic to China, with bright orange-red coat color and most of the body stripes are diamond-shaped stripes, and the South China tiger was once widely distributed in the area south of the Yellow River Basin in the east to the north of the Pearl River, and is considered to be a more ancient tiger subspecies because its skull structure is closest to the morphology of the original tiger. Unfortunately, the South China tiger, known as the "Chinese tiger", has become functionally extinct in the wild. The zoo is the last ark of this precious tiger subspecies.
Image source: Shanghai Zoo
3 Bengal tigers
Second only to the Siberian tiger in weight, it has a darker coat than the Siberian tiger and is lighter than the South China tiger, and is mainly distributed in India and Bangladesh, and there are also a few in Nepal, Bhutan and southeastern Tibet, China. More than half of the world's wild tigers are Bengal tigers, which are rare in the Wild China, and only a very small number of individuals will wander around. White individuals emerging from genetic mutations that control coat color appear in Bengal tigers.
4 Indochinese tiger
Also known as the Southeast Asian tiger, the darker coat and the body are mostly shorter, narrower single stripes, distributed in Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and Yunnan, China, and the number of wild Indochinese tigers in 2011 is estimated to be about 342, the vast majority of which live in Thailand. So far, the last time a wild Indochinese tiger was photographed in China was in 2007, and there has been no news since.
5 Malay Tiger
It is smaller, similar in appearance to the Indochinese tiger, and lives mainly in the south-central Part of the Malay Peninsula. Based on hidden camera footage from 2010 to 2013, it is estimated that there are only 250-340 wild Malay tigers left, which is one of the national symbols of Malaysia and represents the bravery and perseverance of malaysians.
3 Sumatran Tiger
The smallest surviving tiger subspecies, found on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, is the only island tiger. In order to adapt to the dimly lit forest environment, their eyes are generally larger than other subspecies, the coat color is the darkest, the stripes on the body are denser than other subspecies, and there are a series of small black spots on the back, side and hind legs, and the current number of wild is less than 400.
Due to human development and overhunting, three tiger subspecies have become extinct in the wild in the 20th century: Caspian tiger, Javan tiger and Bali tiger.
Swipe down to view
From top to bottom, they are Caspian tigers, Javan tigers, and Balinese tigers
At the Hangzhou Zoo, 2 Siberian tigers and 1 white Bengal tiger are on display, and interested friends can come to find out their differences.
protect
protect
Compared to the past 100 years, wild tiger populations have disappeared by 96 percent. In the past 50 years, the number of wild tigers in the world has plummeted from 100,000 to less than 5,000.
In China, tiger footprints once spread almost all over the country, and now there are fewer than 40 wild tigers, most of which live in the sino-Russian border. Threats to the survival of tigers mainly come from habitat destruction and fragmentation, illegal hunting leads to the lack of food for tigers and populations are too small for individuals to communicate with.
Wild tiger is a sign of the health of the forest ecosystem, the number of tigers is large, indicating that the tiger has more prey, but also shows that the forest vegetation is good, can meet the growth and reproduction needs of herbivores, healthy forests are of great significance to humans, if the tiger is extinct, the impact on the earth's ecology is far-reaching and abnormal, so the protection of tigers is to protect human beings themselves.
The tiger's conservation journey
In 1969, the IUCN of the International Union for Conservation of Nature adopted a resolution calling on the world to work together to save tigers.
● In 1988, China promulgated the Wildlife Protection Law of the People's Republic of China, which listed tigers as national first-class protected animals.
In 2006, the Wildlife Conservation Society International (WCS) launched the Tiger Forever project, which aims to increase tiger populations by 50 percent through a decade of conservation efforts.
●In 2020, at the International Forum for the Protection of Tigers, July 29 of each year was designated as World Tiger Day.
● In 2021, the State Council approved the construction of the Siberian Tiger National Park.
Through thousands of years of time and space,
The tiger evolved from a small paleo-carnivore to become a big cat we are familiar with. They are highly resilient top predators, but they are unable to cope with the damage of advanced human weapons and the encroachment on their homeland.
If there is no human protection,
It is likely that in just a decade, the remaining population of tigers will soon disappear. As long as you are willing to resist tiger-related products and protect their habitat, then in the future, this beautiful big cat can finally get out of the predicament and meet new hope.
Source: Hangzhou Zoo & Hangzhou Children's Park
Editor: Gu Jiangping