Even after 40 years, seeing a tiger in the wild still fills Ullas Karanth with awe: “Tigers are beyond anything a human painter or sculptor can create,” says Karanth, founder of the Wildlife Research Centre, an Indian conservation group where he has studied tigers since the 1980s.
Tigers can weigh more than 600 pounds and leap sideways as much as 20 feet to take down prey nearly five times their weight. But despite their strength and ferocity, their position at the top of the food chain in their habitat makes them vulnerable. To survive, a tiger must eat about 100 pounds of meat every week, the equivalent of eating about 50 large animals such as deer or antelope per year. “That means tigers need a very large amount of land,” Karanth says. “But land alone is not enough; that land has to be filled with prey.”
But over the past century or so, humans have moved closer, clearing vast swaths of habitat for farmland and livestock. Hunting and poaching have also decimated prey populations. The global population of tigers, estimated at 100,000 across parts of Asia and the Middle East in 1900, is now estimated at 4,500. That's up from 3,200 in 2010, but Abishek Harihar, a researcher at the conservation group Panthera, says the 2010 figure was probably an underestimate. The increase more likely reflects improved survey efforts and methodology, rather than an increase in numbers, he says. Surprisingly, tigers now occupy less than 7 percent of their historic range.
Direct conflict with humans also exacerbates the tigers' plight. In India, home to about 70 percent of the world's wild tigers, population growth and development are driving humans closer to tigers. Millions of people now live in “buffer zones” around tiger reserves, and tigers kill 50 to 60 people and hundreds of livestock each year, sometimes in retaliation killings.
Karanth's daughter, Chrissy Karanth, a renowned wildlife researcher who now heads the Wildlife Research Center, devotes a great deal of time and resources to reducing human-wildlife conflict. One of the center's programs works with about 2,000 rural communities to facilitate access to government funds set aside for people who have lost family members or livestock to animal attacks. “These payments don't fully compensate people for their emotional or financial losses, but they help them cope,” Chrissy Karanth told me. “If these payments don't reach people quickly, it increases the likelihood of retaliation and builds resentment toward tigers.”
Another program, now in about 1,000 rural schools, teaches children about the important role tigers and other animals play in local ecosystems. Otherwise, “kids will view wild animals with hostility and fear,” says Krissy Karanth. It also teaches students simple tips for staying safe around wild animals, like carrying a flashlight and speaking loudly when traveling in groups. “If we can teach empathy, that all non-human lives matter, I think both humans and tigers will be better off.”