The Corbett Project

I was super excited to see a couple of video clips over the past two days that have appeared on the BBC website. A mating population of tigers up in the Himalayas of Bhutan. And whats more, evidence that some may be living above 4000m. Thats an amazing re-discovery in itself. Corbett would have been happy. Also a new video of snow leopards in the same area has emerged- I believe this is the first instance of these two magnificent cats occurring in the same area in recorded history.

However, my elation lasted for about 30 seconds. The full horror dawned on me that these documentary film-makers were doing tigers no favors at all.

If you found a hidden cache of something valuable, would you announce it to the world, knowing that there are evil persons that have a determined interest in snatching it?

Thats is exactly the case here. The traditional chinese medicine (TCM) mafia are after every hair of every tiger they can get their hands on. I can understand the value of this discovery to scientists, but please, we have to stop enabling these murderers by disclosing the locations of the last remaining tigers. No matter how many under-cover documentarians demonstrate the undeniable nexus between illegal poaching and TCM, the people who are in the market, the same who believe in the efficacy of these products – i.e., the large proportion of the chinese populace have no shame or compunction towards these atrocities.

If you do not believe in the extremely greedy and long arms of the TCM mafia, here is but one, recent, exhibit.

and here is a link to an article in the Guardian newspaper, from where this image is also sourced.