A Terrible Month for Tigersby Courtney Mroch | More from this Blogger 26 Dec 2007 03:09 PM
Photo By Marieke Kuijpers Two Siberian tigers killed in less than a week at two different zoos...what the heck's going on here? There's only like 400 in the world as it is. Like mountain gorillas, they're on the severely endangered list. So why have two purposely been killed recently? Let's take a look. The Slaughter in China Leads to Discoveries of Tiger Neglect On Thursday December 20th a female Siberian tiger was found beheaded and skinned at the Three Gorges Forest Wild Animal World in a province of Yichang City, China. They're still not sure what happened, but investigators suspect the tiger was first tranquilized (four tranquilizer guns were found at the scene), then dragged from the cage and skinned. Lovely. Why? They're not sure, but in China tiger parts are revered for their medicinal purposes. They think that might have something to do with it. The zoo was closed following the slaughter, but investigations revealed seven other tigers had also died in the zoo's care prior to this one. Three tigers died of starvation in 2003, four other died of injuries received during fights or sicknesses. Then they also found two tiger cubs in the zoo's refrigerator. None of the other tiger deaths were reported until officials started investigating the murder on December 20th. Sad. Tiger Escapes, Mauls Three, Killing One This one's getting more airtime than the tiger murder I mentioned above. Of course it is. It's more sensational when a tiger kills a man, as pathetic as that is... Anyway, the female Siberian Tiger got loose at the San Francisco Zoo on Christmas Day and attacked three men, killing one of them. When police arrived they found the tiger sitting by one of the victims and killed it. (It's not clear if they felt threatened it was preparing to attack them or if they felt it was going to attack the victim again. I read conflicting reports about that part.) At any rate, another Siberian tiger's dead and another investigation is under way. This time to determine how the tiger got out of its enclosure in the first place. Maybe she heard about the fate of her sister tiger half way around the world and was mad about it? Related Articles Tiger Populations Dwindle in India What Do You Get When You Cross a...? San Francisco's Most Popular Seasonal Events Photo credit: Learn more about Courtney Mroch  Courtney Mroch is a wife, a proud pet parent, and a writer. She's been with her husband, high school sweetheart Wayne Pryor, over 20 years, married 11 of those. She's "mom" to Mr. Meow, a.k. Relevantpets tags User Comments  Valorie Delp (49340) 26 Dec 2007 04:23 PMThe way the news story was first read last night. . .the newscaster was a little vague and I caught the last part of the story. . .a few words here and there. . .bronx. . .headed west. . . (We live about 5 miles directly west of the Bronx Zoo!) Then he came on a couple minutes later and apologized. Apparently his mic wasn't working properly or something so he repeated the whole thing. . .we all got a good chuckle at my confusion!!! ;-) Sad, sad, sad. . .especially the story in China.  Courtney Mroch (9169) 27 Dec 2007 01:52 PMOH MY GOODNESS! I can just imagine your panic at thinking a tiger was loose and headed in your direction! What a crack up. Thankfully that wasn't the case, but you're right...it's all so sad. And I believe they'll find out humans were to blame for the escape in the first place, which just makes it even sadder to me... Community Tags endangered species, siberian tigers, tigers, zoos Discuss this article
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