Tiger · Asia largest cat — subspecies maps, 1973 Project Tiger, and roughly 4,000 remaining wild animals still frame a century of recovery arithmetic.
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Global estimates in the 2020s sit near 4,000-5,500 depending on the year and method. India holds the majority. The number is a camera-trap product, not a Victorian hunter tale.
India wild counts rose from a 1970s crisis to the largest national population. Methods changed (pugmarks to cameras), so the graph is not a single instrument. Southeast Asia did not copy the rebound.
A 2010 pledge by tiger-range states in St Petersburg to double wild numbers by 2022. Some countries gained; others lost. The slogan outlived the deadline.
Lions are Vulnerable with a wider African footprint and a tiny Gir relic. Tigers are Endangered, more forest-bound, and culturally heavier in South and East Asia. Scores stay relative across all 24 types.
A hunter of man-eaters who wrote Man-Eaters of Kumaon (1944) and later lent his name to India first national park -- a colonial-to-reserve arc.
Panthera tigris tigris now lumps many mainland tigers in some taxonomies; Amur animals still have a Russian-Chinese border programme and a different prey winter.
IUCN: Endangered
Icons here are not a ranking of living animals as best. They are the Wikipedia-titled faces a later chapter can attach images to.
Stats are relative 0-100 marks inside this type, for comparison on the page, not a global scoreboard.
Tisha Mukherjee · CC BY-SA 4.0
The numerical centre of the living species.
Bengal tiger (P. t. tigris, India / Bangladesh) is filed here as a dated individual, programme or portrayal -- not as a rank of the living animal.
“Icons teach constraints: law, habitat and methods matter as much as a famous face.”
Appaloosa · CC BY-SA 3.0
Snow-and-ungulate border programme.
Siberian / Amur tiger (Russian Far East, Russia / China) is filed here as a dated individual, programme or portrayal -- not as a rank of the living animal.
“Icons teach constraints: law, habitat and methods matter as much as a famous face.”
Unknown author Unknown author · Public domain
Hunter-author; park namesake.
Jim Corbett (1875-1955, India / UK) is filed here as a dated individual, programme or portrayal -- not as a rank of the living animal.
“Icons teach constraints: law, habitat and methods matter as much as a famous face.”
NTCA-era reserve system.
Project Tiger (1973-, India) is filed here as a dated individual, programme or portrayal -- not as a rank of the living animal.
“Icons teach constraints: law, habitat and methods matter as much as a famous face.”
St Petersburg doubling politics.
Global Tiger Forum / Tx2 (2010-, International) is filed here as a dated individual, programme or portrayal -- not as a rank of the living animal.
“Icons teach constraints: law, habitat and methods matter as much as a famous face.”
THerrington · CC BY-SA 3.0
A named tigress economy.
Ranthambore / Machli (tourism tigress, India) is filed here as a dated individual, programme or portrayal -- not as a rank of the living animal.
“Icons teach constraints: law, habitat and methods matter as much as a famous face.”
J. Patrick Fischer · CC BY-SA 3.0
Subspecies as a warning, not a rebound.
South China tiger (wild-extinct, China) is filed here as a dated individual, programme or portrayal -- not as a rank of the living animal.
“Icons teach constraints: law, habitat and methods matter as much as a famous face.”
Shihabur Rahman · CC BY-SA 4.0
Swimming, cyclone, and conflict subtype.
Sundarbans tigers (mangrove, India / Bangladesh) is filed here as a dated individual, programme or portrayal -- not as a rank of the living animal.
“Icons teach constraints: law, habitat and methods matter as much as a famous face.”
Stats are relative 0–100 marks within this species, for comparison only.
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Project Tiger grew on inviolate cores. Relocation ethics and corridor science still split the file.
A national rise can hide Indochinese collapse. The Red List reads the map, not the press conference.
A social pantherine whose prides, Gir relic and 2015 Cecil killing still structure African conservation politics.
Overall 66 🐘The atlas type is the bush elephant -- an ecosystem engineer whose ivory ban (1989) and split from forest elephants still structure African conservation.
Overall 61 🐺A Holarctic pack hunter whose 1995 Yellowstone return and older Leopold ethics still structure predator politics.
Overall 78 🐼A bamboo specialist whose WWF logo, Wolong quake and 2016 IUCN downlist from EN to VU made a recovery into a brand.
Overall 41 🐻A marine bear whose seal-and-ice budget made Churchill, Knut and climate models into one public animal.
Overall 56 🦍The atlas type is the western gorilla -- a knuckle-walking ape whose Fossey-era mountain cousins and Koko lab fame split one public name.
Overall 45 🐋The largest animal whose 1966 IWC protection, 1982 moratorium and still-thin Antarctic recovery define a hunted giant.
Overall 65