Save the Tiger

The tiger is what biologists call a "charismatic megafauna." This is a somewhat pejorative term for big animals that everyone knows and wants to save sometimes at the expense of even more endangered but less sexy animals. Everyone knows a tiger when one sees one, and the animal is the mascot of innumerable schools including Oliver Ames because it epitomizes power and grace. Today the tiger is in trouble with only 1200 in the wild in India and 1000 more scattered from Siberia to Sumatra. Luckily, unlike the panda, tigers breed fairly often in captivity so its unlikely that we will lose the species completely in our lifetime.

The BBC has a four minute video today about ecotourism in one of India's best tiger parks. The park is host to many spectacular animals, but whenever a tiger is sighted convoys of land rovers converge on the poor beast. The intrepid reporter goes on to show us how to tour the park on the back of an elephant. Tigers and grown up elephants apparently have a rapprochement so the reporter got close to three tigers. The video also makes a point about charismatic megafauna. Everyone cares about saving tigers, but hardly anyone gives a damn about saving grey junglefowl, the wild ancestor of chickens.  However, in order to save the tiger we must also save large swaths of habitat and that helps save the junglefowl and many other species as well. Thus, tigers make good mascots for promoting biodiversity in their native lands.

At NRT we are often asked to put in more trails through our woods for wildlife viewing or to connect with outside properties. We avoid this as much as possible to give wildlife quiet places to live. Watch the BBC video, and you may understand why. The trails at Sheep Pasture are designed to let wildlife be seen if they want to be, but to remain unseen if that is their choice. By the way, horseback riding is forbidden at Sheep Pasture, but there is apparently no ban on riding your elephant.