08.01.04
TIGER
By
Stephen Mills
Is
human behaviour changing tiger behaviour? Why
do so few tigers eat human beings? How many tigers are left? And,
should people be encouraged to go out into the field and watch tigers?
These
are among the questions addressed by Stephen Mills in Tiger, in
which he draws on the latest research together with his own personal
experiences of tigers in the field, to provide an authoritative
and engaging portrait of this extraordinary species.
Mills
looks at the impact of humans on tigers and has developed a theory
which suggests that man may actually be changing tiger behaviour.
Shrinking habitats are increasingly confining tigers, forcing them
to live in unnaturally high densities in some areas. Consequently,
young males, who would normally disperse to new areas far from their
mother's home range, cannot move. Instead they have to stay close
to home in frequent contact with their immediate relatives.
Mills
connects this change to the fact that in such high density areas
there often seems to be less not more aggression between tigers
and fewer incidents of infanticide. Males sometimes kill tiger cubs
so they can mate with the mothers and pass on their particular genes.
But they don't kill their own cubs nor, perhaps, those to whom they
know they are closely related. Mills suspects that in confined habitats
where tigers are more likely to be aware of their kinship they are
reluctant to attack each other.
In Tiger, Stephen Mills also puts forward a new theory as to why
so few tigers kill humans (estimated at fewer than 3 per cent of
tigers, even in dangerous areas like the Sundarbans). Mills's theory
centres on the size and shape of humans and the squatting position
many are in at the time of the attack. Mills says that a tiger's
success in attacking any prey depends on its confidence and experience.
When
faced with a standing human being a tiger is disconcerted because
face to face the human looks very big but from the side he all but
disappears, having no "back". This puzzles the predator,
putting it off its stride. When the human
is squatting, however, he presents a much more familiar target and
this is why the comparatively few fatal attacks which occur are
often upon people who are cutting grass, collecting wood or pulling
up roots.
In
Tiger, Mills asserts that people should be encouraged to go out
into the field and watch tigers, contrary to a number of recent
articles in the press, which have said that 'tiger tourism' is bad
for tigers. Mills argues it is bad tourism and not tourism itself,
which should be stopped and that tiger tourism has a valuable role
to play in tiger conservation. Mills argues that:
-
Tourists offer free patrolling: fewer tigers are poached when
tourists visit and when the tourist numbers drop during the monsoon
season, tigers are more likely to be poached.
-
The free patrolling offered by tourists helps prevent mismanagement
of areas and corruption.
- Tourism
provides kudos to the people working with the tigers and gives
a visible significance to their work and keeps the tigers on the
map.
-
Tourism can be a funding supply to the local community if wisely
tapped.
Tiger
contains up-to-date information on how and where to try and see
tigers in the wild. Mills also looks at the issue of how many of
this endangered species are left. While no one knows for certain
how many tigers are left, some suspect there could be as few as
5,000 wild tigers remaining worldwide.
Beautifully
illustrated with over 100 colour photos and maps Tiger is the definitive
book on tigers. Stephen Mills is available for interview.
Published:18th
March 2004
Price: Β£19.99
ISBN: 0563 488735
Also
available in the same series: Shark, by Mark Cawardine.
About
The Author:
Stephen Mills has been a professional naturalist all his working
life and has been studying tigers in India and Nepal since the 1980s.
He wrote the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ film Tiger's Crisis, which helped to bring the
rise in poaching for trade in tiger parts to international attention
and shook the conservation community out of complacency. The film
won top awards at most of the major TV film festivals in 1994. Stephen
wrote the cover story for the launch issue of Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ Wildlife magazine
in 1983 and has been a regular contributor to the magazine ever
since.
As
a writer, producer and cameraman he has made 35 films for TV, working
on influential Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ series such as The Private Life of Plants and
Land of The Tiger. He also wrote and filmed the Βι¶ΉΤΌΕΔ tiger film,
Man-Eater: To Be or Not To Be, broadcast worldwide. Stephen is a
former chairman of the International Association of Wildlife Film-makers,
whose membership includes many of the world's leading natural history
filmmakers.
He
has published over 300 articles and is the author of Nature In Its
Place, which was published in 1988. As a leading wildlife film-maker
he has been nearly eaten or nearly trampled on by most of the word's
big animals. For the last ten years he has also been leading trips
mainly to look for tigers in India.
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