Tiger Tuesday!

    How did you start a ‘Tiger’ Tuesday?  That’s easy with a saucer of milk and some meow-servation about Javan Tigers.  They are also extinct, as a lot of you already know, and wait a meow-minute! Why a saucer of milk?  Meee-ow always remember that a kitty is pawing out these ‘tails!’

          Why did the Javan Tiger become extinct?  They disappeared bepaws of the easiest reasons imaginable habitat loss and humans.  Again, I don’t know what it is with tigers and humans but you humans seem to be intent on wiping the whole tiger population but I’m not going to get on another rant-meeeee-ow…

          It looks like this tiger became extinct in the mid-1970s.  Some think it disappeared in 1976.  If you stop and think about it that wasn’t that long ago.  The 1970s weren’t a time of ignorance, people knew that there were animals out there in serious trouble.  According to the IUCN Red List, they were even becoming rare in the 1960s.  Again, it’s a shame that humans couldn’t go in there and make a rescue to at least get a small group in captivity.  The Javan Tiger is, again, a lesson for people who rant and rave about zoos.  Why?  If zoos weren’t around can you imagine the number of wild animal populations that would be wiped out today?

          At this very second?

          Back to the Javan Tigers history, did you know that they were around over 120000 years ago and maybe even longer than that?  Scientists believe that they roamed around Borneo and even on one of those islands in the Philippines.  That is purr-ty meowy in my book but isn’t it kind of sad?  This tiger had been around for a long time and only disappeared in 1976- think about that 1976, 40 years ago.  More should’ve been done to save it in my book.

          Pawing along though when it comes to some kind of description- size wise these tigers were only slightly smaller than the ones on the Asian mainland.  What’s important to note is the males, supposedly, grew bigger than the Sumatran Tiger!  And meee-ow of course we’ll get to the Sumatran tiger at some point.  There is plenty of information here for A LOT of future reading, trust me.

          When it came to prey the Javan Tiger liked to eat wild boar, Rusa Deer and banteng.  The tiger started getting in trouble when the Rusa Deer started to disappear from the island.  You see Java became the home of a lot of coffee and rubber plantations so that didn’t do any of these animals favors.  But I will say this there are still lots of sighting of this tiger and a scientist even believes this animal is still alive.  Check out this site: http://listverse.com/2013/11/11/10-extinct-animals-alleged-to-still-be-alive/

          And meee-ow let me just meow this- if this tiger is still alive I hope scientists tell-NO ONE.  I know that sounds weird but who wants people like Trump’s sons going down to hunt them?  With that last meow- I will see you on ‘Siberian Tiger’ Sunday!