Joining us this month is Kingsmark Bengals, who are located in Mountain Center, California. Kingsmark Bengals currently have a litter of golden rosetted bengal kittens (males and females available). They were born in September and are now ready to go to forever homes. Kittens are registered with TICA. See breeder listing for further details and contact info.
Joining us this month is Amunra Cattery, which is based is Milwaukee in Wisconsin. Amunra currently have a litter of brown rosetted bengal kittens available. They were born on October 25th and will be ready to go to new forever homes on Decemember 27th. Kittens will be TICA registered, up to date on vaccinations etc. See breeder ad for pedigree info, further photos and contact details.
A wild tiger cub attacked by villagers has died in a central Indian zoo two days after vets tried to save it with a rare blood transfusion, officials say.
The cub, Juhi, initially showed signs of improvement but suddenly went into convulsions and died, officials said.
Another cub found at the same time near the city of Nagpur in the state of Maharashtra is getting better and responding to treatment.
Loss of habitat has brought tigers into conflict with humans in India.
The blood transfusion is believed to be the first carried out on a tiger in India and was done after its haemoglobin dropped to “dangerously low” levels.
The eight-month-old cub was named Juhi after a fragrant white flower native to India.
‘Several complications’
“We tried a lot but I guess it was not enough. We could not save the cub. It had not eaten for days and was severely dehydrated. It was suffering from haemorrhagic gastroenteritis,” Dr Sunil Bavaskar, one of the vets commented.
He said that a team of vets was now working to ensure that Juhi’s sister, called Jai, or Victory, survives.
“We will make sure that she recovers but I doubt if she will be able to survive in the wild. The fact that they strayed near human civilisation shows they cannot hunt. Also we do not know when they lost their mother.”
The chief wildlife officer in Nagpur, stated that the two cubs were found last week near Chandrapur, a forest area.
“One of them was given a blood transfusion. There were several complications, including external infections and damage to intestines,” he said.
A team of vets worked for over two days to save the cub – which was given blood from a tiger held in captivity near Mumbai (Bombay).
Mr Majumdar said that the death of the cub was a “sad moment”.
“We have lost the battle,” he told the Associated Press news agency. “She got convulsions this morning [Tuesday] and we tried our best to save her.
“But she stopped breathing and that’s how the end came.”
Juhi and Jai were found near the Tadoba tiger reserve as they were being chased by villagers who wanted to kill them because they feared the animals would attack children and cattle.
Experts say that there are only about 1,500 tigers in the wild in India – down from about 3,600 six years ago and an estimated 100,000 a century ago.
Human encroachment on their habitats, poaching and busy roads and railways have all been blamed for their demise.
Joining us as a new advertiser on the website this month is Mystic Winds Bengals, who are located in Arroyo Grande in California. Mystic Winds have rosetted, spotted and marbled bengals available throughout the year. See breeder listing for contact details.
Joining us as new advertisers this month are Dazzling Bengals. Dazzling are based in Ashbourne, Derbyshire in the UK and they currently have a litter of brown rosetted bengal kittens. They were sired by Champion Dazzledots Total Eclipse and will be ready to go to forever homes in early Feb 2009. See breeder listing on the main site for photos, pedigree info and contact information.
Australia: Perth:Two Sumatran tiger cubs from opposite ends of Oz have made a healthy contribution towards removing their species from the critically endangered list.
3 cubs born to 8 year old Sumatran tiger Setia made their first public appearance at the Perth Zoo on Monday.
The trio:- 2 males, Jaya and Satri, and a female, Melati – were born on the 20th August from a mating between Setia and 12-year-old Hari, who was transferred from the Cairns Wildlife Safari Reserve to breed with the Perth born tiger.
After a 2 week program to prepare them for public life, Perth zookeeper Emma Woodhouse said the siblings were still very shy.
“This is all very new for them, as you can imagine. They’ve been tucked away for three months under the care and watchful eye of mum in their den,” Ms Woodhouse said.
Behind the scenes, the new siblings have already established strong personalities and their own pecking order.
“We’ve got two males and a female, so the stronger of the males, the bravest, he tends to run the show and the other two follow,” Ms Woodhouse said.
“The little girl is quite shy, just like her mother, and will generally follow if her big brothers are around. (Otherwise), she tends to keep to herself, tucked away.”
The 3 cubs will stay at Perth Zoo for at least 18 months before being transferred to new homes in Australia or overseas as part of an international effort to breed more of the species.
There are less than 500 Sumatran tigers left in the wild, and the worldwide captive population stands at 250.
The 3 cubs are particularly valuable for breeding purposes because neither Hari nor Setia have bred before, so they will be a welcome boost to the gene pool.
Perth Zoo senior vet Simone Vitali said the zoo had a successful Sumatran tiger breeding record.
“We’ve had some very enthusiastic mother and father tigers,” Ms Vitali said.
The new cubs, which weighed 500g at birth, had flourished, she said.
After trebling their birth weight in their first 15 days, the boys now weighed in at 9kg while their little sister is now almost 8kg.
“They are still drinking mother’s milk, and they’ve just started eating meat,” Ms Woodhouse said.
Hari would return soon to his home in Cairns, as he had no role in raising the cubs.
It was reported this week that a Singapore Zoo cleaner has died after being attacked by 3 tigers.
The cleaner – Nordin Bin Montong was mauled by the white Bengal tigers (Read about the history of the bengal cat here) after crossing a moat surrounding their enclosure. Eye witnesses reported that he was acting erratically.
The alarm was raised by zookeepers after they heard horrified visitors screaming.
They managed to distract the tigers and pull Mr Nordin away but he died of his injuries on the way to hospital. Police are investigating the incident.
Reports say that witnesses saw the cleaner climb into the enclosure and wade through the 33 foot wide moat. He then approached the tigers with a broomstick and a bucket. The largest tiger then lunged at Mr Nordin, who fell immediately and recoiled into a foetal position.
“Police are still investigating. We are not able to say exactly what happened,” said the assistant director of zoology, Biswajit Guha.
“But he was throwing things around and passing comments like ‘goodbye, you won’t see me again’,” said Mr Guha.
An Australian couple visiting the zoo told the Straits Times they had seen Mr Nordin shouting and throwing things as he walked past a crocodile earlier in the day.
Singapore Zoo has closed the white tiger exhibit as a precautionary measure.
The World Wide Fund for Nature reported this week that Russian PM – Vladamir Putin has recently signed a decree that will create a long campaigned for, protected area that wil be home for up to half of all remaining Far Eastern leopards.
Far-Eastern leopards are the only leopard species in the world which are capable of surviving the prolonged cold periods and harsh Russian winters. The leopards now number only about 30 in the wild, and are on the brink of extinction.
They face continual threats from unregulated tourism, forest fires and habitat loss from logging. They also face additional threats from poaching and from the problems associated with inbreeding due to their small population numbers.
The new reserve will join two small protected areas into one, called Leopardovy Zakaznik (Leopard nature sanctuary), and will be managed by the Ministry of Nature Resources of Russia. According to the decree, the ministry will also manage neighbouring Kedrovaya Pad nature reserve.
Before the decree, all three protected areas had been managed by different state agencies whose differing mandates meant that a unified Leopard conservation strategy was not in place. The transfer of jurisdiction to a single authoritiy will allow for a single strategy that places the restoration of the leopard population at the heart of its operations in the area.
WWF proposed this change as early as 1999, in its Strategy for conservation of the Far Eastern leopard in Russia. “We are happy that finally, after all these years, the government has addressed this issue”, says WWF-Russia CEO Igor Chestin. “We hope that the Ministry will immediately start improving management of the protected area to ensure effective leopard conservation. WWF is ready to provide help and advice to the new sanctuary”.
To ensure Far-Eastern leopard protection, WWF created anti-poaching groups in the region. WWF also cooperates with Chinese conservation agencies to create a trans-border system of protected areas that sought to save the leopards habitat from industrial pollution. Education programs to inform locals of the threats facing this extremely rare cat species were set up, while customs agents were trained to track poachers who illegally sell leopard parts to China.
In 2007, WWF built a visit centre for the future protected area, which now will finally be given to the Leopardovy zakaznik, and will hope to create revenue that can go towards making the sanctuary commercially viable.
United Kingdom: Norfolk:
Malyshka, a tiger at Banham Zoo in Norfolk, England, has recently given birth to 2 cubs (believed to be the first to be born in captivity in the UK this year). The two Amur (Siberian)tiger cubs were born at Banham in mid October and are currently being observed using infra-red closed circuit television cameras. The zoo said that, Malyshka, the mother, is amongst the moist important females in the European breeding programme. Malyshka was previously at a Russian zoo and came to Banham zoo as a 2 year old in 2006. She has few relatives within the breeding programme (Breeding of tigers in captivity is closely monitored to ensure that the maximum amount of genetic diversity is preserved). It is believed that there are around 450 – 500 Amur tigers left in the wild
Texaswild Exotics, who are located in Trenton, Texas, are pleased to announce the birth on a new litter of F1 bengal kittens (all females). They were sired by Asian Leopard Cat – King Kamai Maie. The kittens were born on November 04th. See breeder advertisment for contact details and further info.