Two hundred years ago there were eight subspecies (or races) of tigers -- all with large and genetically healthy populations - ranging West to East from Turkey to Siberia and covering most of Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent.

The Caspian Tiger, Panthera tigris virgata, represented the western-most distribution of the tiger - occupying several coastal and lake-centered regions from the Caspian Sea in the West to Lake Balkhash in the East, and including parts of what are now Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, China, Iran (Persia), Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The Caspian race was isolated from other tigers by the Himalayan Mountains, dependent on a thin stock of forest dwelling deer, and ultimately found itself in competition with humans for territory. The Caspian tiger has been extinct since the 1970s.

Moving East, in 1800, we would next encounter the Royal Bengal Tiger, Panthera tigris tigris. There were probably at least 100,000 Bengal tigers as recently as the late 19th century with a range that covered almost the entire Indian subcontinent, and included regions of what are now Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar (Burma), Nepal and even eastern Pakistan. During the course of the twentieth century the population of Bengal tigers decreased by more than 95%, dropping to a low of perhaps two thousand in the 1970s. Thanks to aggressive protection efforts by the Indian government, the tiger made a comeback in the 1980s, peaking at a high of almost five thousand in the early nineties. However the very success of the Indian Tiger Project led to bureaucratic complacency and attracted poachers who had run out of tigers in China and Indonesia. Today there are no more than three thousand tigers left in India, plus perhaps a few hundred combined in small preserves in Bangladesh, Bhutan, Burma and Nepal. The Bengal Tiger is extinct in Pakistan.

Painting of Bengal Tiger Hunt in India

The Indochinese tiger, Panthera tigris corbetti, (named for the former French colony of Indochina, which today includes the countries of Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam) occupied almost all of Southeast Asia and ranged North to South from Burma to Malaysia. Today there are a series of isolated ranges in Burma, Cambodia, Laos, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam with a total population of no more than 1,200 tigers.

Until recently, there were three island races of tigers in Indonesia: the Balinese Tiger, Panthera tigris balica, on Bali; the Javan Tiger, P. tigris sondaica, on Java; and the Sumatran Tiger, P. tigris sumatrae, on Sumatra. The Balinese tiger became extinct in the 1940's, followed by the Javan in the 1980s. Today only the Sumatran tiger remains, and its continued survival is in doubt, as poaching and habitat encroachment have left it clinging to life with a total population not exceeding 400 animals.

At one time, China was home to four distinct races of tigers: (1)  the Caspian in the Northeast corner, (2) the Indochinese along the borders of Burma and Indochina, (3)  the South-China tiger P. tigris amoyensis - believed by many biologists to the "original" tiger - throughout Southeastern China, and (4) the Siberian tiger P. tigis altaica in Manchuria. Today there is some question as to whether there are any tigers surviving in the wild in China, as there have been no well-documented sightings in recent years. The Caspian is extinct everywhere. The Indochinese and Siberian have been completely extirpated in China. If the South-China tiger does survive in the wild, experts believe the entire population consists of no more than 30 individuals.

The Siberian tiger, which once lived throughout Northeast Asia: Manchuria, Korea, and Siberia, today survives in only one nominally protected area in Siberia, numbers no more than 300 animal, and faces imminent annihilation from poachers seeking profit from the sale of its parts for Asian medicines.

Sadly, the collective human desire to kill tigers and turn their parts into magical panaceas and elixirs seems greater than the desire to protect and defend these marvelous cats. Soon the skins, trinkets and recipes for tiger penis soup -- for which they are being slaughtered today -- may be all we have to remind us of the greatest of felines.

Photo of extinct Caspian Tiger. Courtesy of Cat Specialist Group

References

Cat Specialist Group web site

CITES

Matthiessen, Peter. Tigers in the Snow Introduction and photographs by Maurice Hornocker. North Point Press, New York. 2000

National Geographic Research Correspondence Division

Thapar, Valmik. The Secret Life of Tigers Oxford University Press, New Delhi. 1999