Amur tiger back from the brink
After a century in which its numbers have dwindled to the point on extinction, the Amur tiger, the largest cat in the world, has made an improbable recovery. According toWWF, the tiger's population is at its highest level for 100 years.The latest census of the tiger, which hides in an isolated region near the Chinese border, shows there are between 480 and 520 animals surviving in the wild. In the 1940s the sub-species had nearly died out, with around 40 tigers left. Most experts put its chances of survival as little higher that the dodo's. Yuri Darman, Head of WWF Russia's fareast office, said the tiger's comeback was good news. But he warned that the species remained critically endangered and was at imminent risk if S\China succeeded in lifting the global ban on tiger products at the Global Tiger Forum in Kathmandu.
(The Hindu, 16th April 2007)
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