TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - The Great Hall of Mount Leuser National Park (BBTNGL) estimated there are only 100 Sumatran tigers (Panthera tigris sumatrae) living in the area, which lies on the provincial border of North Sumatra and Aceh.
"This is based on the preliminary results of data collection by field officers," Sapto Prabowo, the Hall's region 3 chief, said on Wednesday, May 25, ANTARA reported.
In the entire island of Sumatera, it is estimated there are only 400 to 500 Sumatran tigers left.
The species' alarming rate of population decline is caused by poaching. The Langkat Police announced that they arrested tiger hunters who were caught trying to sell tiger fur yesterday. The fur had belonged to young tigers aged around 5 years old.
"The tigers they killed are teenagers because the fangs are hollow and the bones are small," he said.
The poachers were selling the fur, fangs and bones of those teen Sumatran tigers for Rp42 million.
"We hope that Sumatran tigers can live safely and comfortably in Mount Leuser National Park. No more poaching as we discovered on Tuesday," he said.
In addition to the Sumatran tiger, Indonesian forests were once home to two endemic subspecies of tigers. The Javan tiger (Panthera tigris soncaica) had extinct in the '70s. The Balinese tiger (Panthera tigris balica) extincted in the 1930s.
Unlike lions, all subspecies of tigers are solitary carnivores on top of its habitat's food chain. They require broad hunting grounds, and it takes dozen of years for them to mature and breed.
ANTARA
