Sumatra: Tiger eats illegal loggers
A Sumatran tiger mauled two illegal loggers to death in western
Indonesia, bringing to five the number of people killed by the
critically endangered cats in less than a month, a conservationist
said today. The tiger attacked a 50-year-old man and his 18-year-old
son yesterday while they slept next to a pile of stolen wood in a
protected forest on Sumatra island, about 600km west of the capital
Jakarta, said Didy Wurdjanto of the state conservation agency.
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Three people were killed in two separate attacks in late January in
the area. Park rangers last week trapped an adult tigress believed
responsible for the deaths and it was being relocated. About 40 people
have been killed by tigers on Sumatra between 2000-2004, according to
the agency.
The Sumatran tiger is the world’s most critically endangered tiger subspecies. Only about 250 of the cats are left in the wild, the Forestry Ministry said, compared to about 1,000 in the 1970s.
The tigers’ diminishing population is largely blamed on poaching and the destruction of their forest habitat for palm oil and wood pulp plantations. In some cases the animals roam into villages or plantations in search of food, setting the stage for a conflict with humans.
In the latest attack, however, the animal had not strayed from its habitat so there would be no effort to catch and relocate it, said Wurdjanto. “This time it was the loggers’ fault,” he said.
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Revenge of The Critters!
d.o.’s last blog post..The King Coal’s Getting His Butt Kicked Enviro Show
Well really, what do they expect the Tiger to do? Its his forest…I just fear for the Tigers, they not only have to cope with their habitat shrinking daily, and the body part trade but also from the Tiger bone wine trade…which is now spreading to Africa, these people are taking our Lionesses now. The price of Lion bone is shooting up as the Asian poachers and hunters move in.
JAKARTA (AFP) — Indonesian villagers have trapped and killed a fourth endangered Sumatran tiger amid a spate of tiger attacks blamed on illegal logging, according to environmental group WWF.
Four tigers and six people have been killed on Sumatra island this month, it said.
“We learnt on February 24 that another Sumatran tiger had been trapped and killed by villagers after it attacked two farmers on Sunday,” WWF spokeswoman Syamsidar told AFP.
“This is the fourth tiger killed this month and we are concerned because it is a protected animal and an endangered species.”
The farmers from Simpang Gaung village in Riau province were seriously injured in the attack, Syamsidar said.
“The tiger in the latest killing had wandered into the village as its habitat had been destroyed by people,” she added.
Indonesian Forestry Minister Malam Sambat Kaban urged the provincial police to arrest the tiger killers, Detikcom news website reported.
“I urge the police to carry out a complete investigation… the killers must be arrested quickly,” he was quoted as saying.
“They can’t kill these tigers as they please. Whatever their excuse, the tigers must be protected.”
There are fewer than 400 Sumatran tigers left in the wild and their increasing contact with people is a result of habitat loss due to deforestation, according to the wildlife group.
It said about 12 million hectares (30 million acres) of forest on Sumatra had been cleared in the past 22 years, a loss of nearly 50 percent islandwide.
The incidents in Riau occurred in an area dotted with pulp and oil palm plantations and recently subjected to burning to clear forests.