14 DAY TRIAL // Wildlife researchers with the Malaysian Conservation Alliance for Tigers (MYCAT) say that, rather than focusing on just one species, conservation projects would do best to also pay close attention to other species that the one they want to save from extinction interacts with.
Specifically, they argue that, in order to save the endangered Malayan tiger from going extinct, it is mandatory that this feline's prey is also given at least some protection.
I am the first to admit that it all sounds a tad like something Captain Obvious would say. Of course one has to protect the tigers' prey if one wants them to survive. Unless one believes that tigers run on air.
Still, it looks like, as matter-of-fact as these things are, three of the species that Malayan tigers like to feast on, i.e. the sambar deer, the bearded pig and the gaur, are surprisingly rare in unprotected forests, Mongabay reports.
Odds are this is because locals are hunting them on a regular basis.
“If sambar deer numbers go down, tiger numbers will too and the evidence is already pointing in that direction,” biologist Mark Rayan explains. The same holds true for other species that these tiger view as prey.
In light of these findings, MYCAT asks for an “urgent and decisive action” to save the Malayan tiger's prey.