Does anyone care if the Tiger went extinct?

[nitish]

It is estimated that here are less than 6000 tigers living in the wild today. Out of the eight known species of tigers, three have become extinct in the last ten years.

I get to use my O rly picture for the first time!!!

Everything you've said so far is shocking. First of all, there are 9 subspecies of tigers, Not 8. And three that have become extinct didn't do so in the last decade, far from it.

From wikipedia with sources cited

* The Balinese tiger (Panthera tigris balica) has always been limited to the island of Bali. These tigers were hunted to extinction—the last Balinese tiger is thought to have been killed at Sumbar Kima, West Bali on 27 September 1937; this was an adult female. No Balinese tiger was ever held in captivity. The tiger still plays an important role in Balinese Hindu religion.

* The Javan tiger (Panthera tigris sondaica) was limited to the Indonesian island of Java. It now seems likely that this subspecies became extinct in the 1980s, as a result of hunting and habitat destruction, but the extinction of this subspecies was extremely probable from the 1950s onwards (when it is thought that fewer than 25 tigers remained in the wild). The last specimen was sighted in 1979, but there was a re-ignition of reported sightings during the 1990s.[26][27]

* The Caspian tiger or Persian Tiger (Panthera tigris virgata) appears to have become extinct in the late 1950s,[28][29] with the last reliable sighting in 1968, though it is thought that such a tiger was last shot dead in the south-eastern-most part of Turkey in 1970. Historically it ranged through Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, the former Soviet Union, and Turkey.[28] The Caspian tiger was a large subspecies and reached nearly the dimensions of the Bengal Tiger. The heaviest confirmed weight of a male was 240 kg. The ground colour was comparable to that of the Indian subspecies, but differed especially in the tight, narrow striping pattern. The stripes were rather dark grey or brown than black. Especially during the winter, the fur was relatively long. The Caspian tiger was one of two subspecies of tiger (along with the Bengal) that was used by the Romans to battle gladiators and other animals, including the Barbary Lion. The Romans traveled far to capture exotic beasts for the arena. There are still occasional reported sightings of the Caspian Tiger in the wild.[29]

 

[winterknight]

*ahem*

Tyger! Tyger! Burning bright
In the forests of the night
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies
Burned the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare He aspire?
What the hand dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder, and what art
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when that heart began to beat
What dread hand? And what dread feet?

What the hammer? What the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? What dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears
And watered Heaven with their tears -
Did He smile, His work to see?
Did He who made the Lamb make thee?

Tyger! Tyger! Burning bright
In the forests of the night
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

(William Blake, from Songs of Experience. Quoted from memory )

 

[neruda]

^ Part of the magic why there is so much attention to the creature.
Well on another note here's a picture that captures the vulnerability of the future:

Comments anyone? Nitish?

 

[Ninja108]

yes I would. They are among th emost majestic, powerful and beatiful animals alive. However, any animal species we lose will be one too many, they are all special in thier own way.

 

[nitish]

^ Part of the magic why there is so much attention to the creature.
Well on another note here's a picture that captures the vulnerability of the future:

Comments anyone? Nitish?

Here is my reply/comment

Quite frankly, i wouldn't miss the tiger.....or the Panda

But i would definitely miss the Seal

 

[LatinoSTAR]

I would cry if tigers went extinct, they are such beautiful creaures, i cant stand people who hunt innocent animals, and call it a sport

 

[neruda]

Here is my reply/comment


Quite frankly, i wouldn't miss the tiger.....or the Panda


But i would definitely miss the Seal

So its a matter of relative aesthetics then?
I mean you didn't say why?

 

[khushibagh]

Tigers are beautiful animals. I would be very sad if they became extinct.

 

[wanderer]

I find this highly offensive. Those who do this are only doing it to satisfy the demand. I bet you know someone that has something made of Ivory. (if not yourself). This is the highest form of hypocrisy. Just like the war on drugs. Let the rich users get away with it and put the bottom of society in prison. You're despicable.

frankly i find both you and your ignorance offensive. sure you want to bet? cause you would loose. i do not own anything ivory, nor do i know anybody who does. sorry to dissapoint you (not really). and since you dont keep up on current events, rich people dont get away with drug crimes when they are caught. they are fined and punished the way "normal" people are like you and me. since drug use is a "crime against yourself" you are not imprisoned for very long. however drug trafficing, and selling ivory and pelts, is illegal, and drug trafficing has very high penalties, and if you are rich, what is the point of trafficing when you already have lots of money??? so it is ironic that you think you know it all when in fact i had to tell you. and here is another fact, in many african and asian animal parks, there ARE teams of men that patrol the land to protect the animals, and will shoot poachers on site. in other places, there is one man per elephant, who carries a rifle and is with the elephant at all times. he will also shoot on site. so these poachers know exactly what they are doing, and are not the poor little peasant folk you are trying to paint them as.

oh, and about your other comment how man causing all the other species to go extinct is part of nature? its a good thing we dont put people in jail for stupidity. as nature goes, animals hunt for food and live to survive. humans are the only animal that hunts for sport and souvenier collecting. that is not natural. these exotic animals are being destroyed for fun. the rest of the ecological environment is also being destroyed in unnatural ways. so in fact, it is YOU that is despicable.

 

[wanderer]

since i have also studied ecological genetics extensively, i will tell you in short why it is important to keep the tiger and other big cats (in their relative environments) alive. in every food web (not a food chain, a food web) there are intermediate and dominant players. when there are fluctuations in population levels of these players, the lower players (like deer, caribu, wildabeast, kangaroos, rabits, etc) tend to experience population explosions. each predator depends on a certain "lower player" in the web, and when that predator is disrupted, the population it fed on grows out of control. big cats and other dominant predators are there to act as somewhat of a wild card, eating other prey in an undedicated manner. these dominant predators are able to maintan the balance when necessary. removing domiant predators from the landscape is damaging to the food web and the ecology, so if you want to keep the tigers for asthetics, that is fine, just know that they have a much bigger role in nature, and have survived and been successful for obvious reasons.

 

[nitish]

frankly i find both you and your ignorance offensive. sure you want to bet? cause you would loose.

l will loose alright.

i do not own anything ivory, nor do i know anybody who does. sorry to dissapoint you (not really).

Oh sure! you know what everyone has at their house. including all your present/past co-workers, your classmates from college, school, and virtually anyone you've ever known. I will loose alright.

and since you dont keep up on current events, rich people dont get away with drug crimes when they are caught. they are fined and punished the way "normal" people are like you and me. since drug use is a "crime against yourself" you are not imprisoned for very long.

Tell that to lindsay lohan.

however drug trafficing, and selling ivory and pelts, is illegal, and drug trafficing has very high penalties, and if you are rich, what is the point of trafficing when you already have lots of money??? so it is ironic that you think you know it all when in fact i had to tell you.

That's my point. Poor people do all the dirty work while rich people enjoy the end product. You need to develop your reading comprehension. The war on drugs and the Ivory trade are similar in that the users get off scott free, while those who sell the illicit products get all the jail time and scorn.

and here is another fact, in many african and asian animal parks, there ARE teams of men that patrol the land to protect the animals, and will shoot poachers on site. in other places, there is one man per elephant, who carries a rifle and is with the elephant at all times. he will also shoot on site. so these poachers know exactly what they are doing, and are not the poor little peasant folk you are trying to paint them as.

I am not trying to paint anyone. If you re read my post, you will notice that i cited my source while you sit here and talk out of your ass.

oh, and about your other comment how man causing all the other species to go extinct is part of nature? its a good thing we dont put people in jail for stupidity. as nature goes, animals hunt for food and live to survive. humans are the only animal that hunts for sport and souvenier collecting. that is not natural. these exotic animals are being destroyed for fun. the rest of the ecological environment is also being destroyed in unnatural ways. so in fact, it is YOU that is despicable.

This is probably beyond the scope of your comprehension skills, but I will try to explain it to you anyway. Disease, misery, and cruelty are part of nature. I just want to establish that unpleasantnesses is part of nature. I also want to establish that nature is not perfect from a subjective point of view. So just because it's meaningless doesn't mean it's not part of nature. Now the point is: When earth was forming, animals weren't part of its nature. They didn't exist. Nature is not one solid state where things stay the same forever. It wasn't part of nature for animals to fly before they did. But guess what! it's natural now. It wasn't natural for animals to kill other animals for sport, but since we're smart enough to do that, it's part of nature now. FYI: Killer whales kill and play with dead/alive seals. Sounds like a sport to me. And all those animals are not dying because of sport, they're dying because of fashion and the exquisite taste of the elite. It's been part of human nature to want finer things in life. Unfortunately, Ivory is considered a status symbol in some parts of the world. It's part of nature to be human. It's part of human nature to want fine things in life. And Ivory is one of those fine things.

Actually, if you want to get into what's natural and what isn't. Conservation is not natural. Wild life rehabilitation is not natural. Let's save the planet is not natural.

 

[mike_n_herrin]

All creatures go extinct at some point. Us included. It's only a matter of time.

while that may be true, it's the rate of extinction that is alarming and that humans have caused the dramatic and sharp increase in that rate. i'm an endangered species biologist, so i certainly care about the tiger and all of our thousands of other listed species. in the US the primary cause for most of our species that are on the endangered/threatened list is habitat loss (either from conversion to other types of habitat or to urbanization). But almost all if it is caused by humans, or at the least tied back to human causes.

 

[madara]

Humans, the great destroyer, it seems that looking through history this is all we really capable of in the end. Well at very least neither me, my sister or my brother will have kids so at least we doing our part now. Cant say it will offset the balance with all these family still having so many kids and hispanic immigrant contributing to double population areas in next decade. Wahoo, more natural land raping for strip malls and cookie cutter housing

 

[winterknight]

I support the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement.