EMPEROR OF ECOSYSTEM
"Killing Tigers is a greed, not a need"
Hello Readers !!!
Our childhood days is incomplete without wild stories. If someone ask who is the king of jungle, within a moment we'll say it as Lion.
But, there is an animal in the jungle which more strong and powerful than lion. That supreme animal is Tiger. One tiger is equivalent to 2 - 3 lions.
The word "Tiger" is derived from the greek word "Tigris" means arrow. The word Tigress was first documented in 1611. The scientific name is "Panthera Tigris" which belongs to cat family.
Tamil Sangam Literatures were often compared Ancient tamils and tigers. Tigers were cited more than lions. If lion is cited once, tigers cited at an average of 15.
The literature Purananooru has a poem about it. It compared the people who steal the wealth from others to rats and should not encourage friendship and the people who earned their own wealth through hardwork to tigers and should encourage friendship with them.
Ancient Tamils respected courage and character of tiger and compared to it. That's why the Chozhas chose tiger as their emblem.
There is a traditional folk dance called "Puliyattam" to represent the characteristics of tiger.
The braveness of tiger is mentioned many times in tamil literature, Pazhamozhi Naanooru. The lines are,
புதற்குப் புலியும் வலியே புலிக்குப் புதலும் வலியாய் விடும்
பசிபெரி தாயினும் புன்மேயா தாகும் புலி
புலிமுகத்து உண்ணி பறித்து விட
Udyoga Parva, a sub-class of Mahabharata, compared the King Dhirdhirashtra an his sons to dense forest and the Pandavas to the tigers.
Tigers belong to carnivores group. Male tigers has length of 2.5-3.9 metres, height of 0.7-1.2 metres and weight 90-310 kgs. Likewise, female tigers has length of 2-2.8 metres, height less than male tigers and weighs 65-170 kgs. The body structure of tiger is slightly bigger than lions. The growl sound of tigers will be audible upto 3 kms. The tail length is 0.6-1.1 metres. It teeth size is 2.5-3.0 inches. The stripes of tigers is similar to fingerprints, it differs from the other.
Even after their death, it has a capacity to stand, which indicates their strength. They can jump upto a height of 20 feet and length of 10 feet. It can run 49-65 km per hour.The life span of tiger is 10-15 years only.
More number of tigers live in South Asia. It prefers social life. It plan their territory with the help of urine. The territory of female tiger will be around 20 square kilometre and male tiger's territory will be 60-100 square kilometres. Most of their territories will be near water areas. It is very rare to see it in group. In that case, when the male tiger hunts a prey, only after feeding its female tiger and cubs, it will eat. But lions will eat first, and it will feed the remaining to its female and cubs. Without fighting like a lion, they can share their prey even to unknown faces. Female tiger will not allow any male tigers near to the cubs except its father, because the cubs get their vision only after two weeks.
It can hunt crocodiles, cheetahs and anacondas. The hunting method vary from animal to animal. For example, to hunt crocodiles, they use their paws to tear the crocodile's eyes.
Among all types, only 5 are alive. They are Siberian Tigers, Bengal Tigers, Indo chinese Tigers, Malayan Tigers and South China Tigers.
Three species were extinct. They are Bali Tigers, Caspian Tigers and Javan Tigers.
They can be at white, blue, gold and black. Blue tigers are said to be alive, but there are no evidence.
Tiger was approved as a National Animal in April 1973. The reason behind was it's mercy, strength and power. If it is needed to choose a national animal, the characteristics of that animal should match with that country. The count of that particular animal should be high when compared to other countries and it should be protected. The characteristics of tiger matches with our country. That's why it has been choosed as our national animal.
"When we lose an animal species to extinction, we lose part of our family"
Tiger has major contribution in the balancing of wild ecosystem. They are supreme hunters. In the absence of tiger, the population of their prey will become more which makes other species extinct.
"Save tigers before they are silenced forever"
In April 1973, the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) introduced Project tiger. It's main objective is to protect the existing tigers. To implement that, forests inhabited by tigers were announced as reserved forests. India has 50 reserved forests in 18 states. Among that, Tamilnadu has four. Tamilnadu stands fifth in the population of tigers. Only by reproduction, tigers population was increased. There are some methods to count the tigers such as M-STRIPES, Pug mark and Distance Sampling. According to this survey, in 2006, the number of tigers were 1411, in 2010, the numbers were 1706, in 2014, the numbers were 2226, and in 2018, the numbers were 2967. India has 80% of tiger population in the world. It is in our hands to save tigers!
Comments
Post a Comment