Last week we visited AquaZoo in Leeuwarden again. We hadn’t been there for a long time. So now they also have Amur tigers. It is beautiful to see when they are fed, pieces of meat are hidden in different places. They fly towards it. Playing with a large buoy in the water is also beautiful to see.
The Amur tiger is the largest feline in the world. Tigers live solitary lives and, like most felines, prefer to live alone. Males usually live in a larger habitat than females. They mark their habitat with scent by urinating everywhere, thus marking their territory. Tigers are the only felines with stripes.
The stripes ensure that tigers can hide well in the forests in which they live. This way they do not stand out and they can sneak up and catch their prey unseen.
The Amur tiger lives in the east of Russia and China in vast and dense forests. Tigers have a thick coat that makes them well adapted to the cold. Previously, they also lived in a large part of Korea and China. In the 1940s, it was estimated that only twenty Amur tigers lived in the wild, this was due to the hunting of the tiger. Russia then committed itself to the protection of both the tiger and its prey, so that there are now about 400 to 500 Amur tigers in the wild again.
The Amur tiger is listed as endangered on the IUCN list. Tigers are illegally hunted for their fur, but also because in many Asian countries it is believed that the body parts of tigers can be used as medicine. For example, the tail is thought to remedy skin problems, tiger bones help against rheumatism, headaches and back pain, the teeth reduce fever and the claws reduce sleeplessness.
