Sumatran tiger found dead with snare around neck
JAKARTA: A protected Sumatran tiger was found dead with a wire snare around its neck in a forest in Siak regency, Riau, last week.
According to the Jakarta Post, sources revealed that palm oil plantation workers found the carcass and reported it to their neighbourhood unit head.
The information was later forwarded to the Riau National Resources Conservation Agency (BKSDA), and the photographs of the tiger were later circulated on social media.
Riau BKSDA official Heru Sutmantoro said an autopsy had been conducted before the tiger was buried.
He said the tiger was an adult female, about 8 to 10 years old, and died due to respiratory failure because of the wire that entangled her neck.
“Field analysis suggested that the tiger was ensnared in a different location from where it was found and that it had died about 10 days ago,” he said.
Heru said companies that held land concessions near the area were responsible for protecting endangered species in the area.
He hoped they would remove snares installed near their areas.
In February, a Sumatran tiger was also found snared to death in a jungle in the Seluma regency.
The Post then reported that the decomposing carcass of the female tiger was found by a villager from Selingsingan.
He was collecting rattan in the Bukit Badas forest, 6km from the village, when he discovered the tiger.
Seluma police special crimes unit head Second Inspector Catur Teguh Susanto said a report was lodged after the villager informed his village chief.
The investigating team found a 10m-long wire snare trap near the dead tiger and a rotten carcass of a pig, presumably used as a bait.
The Sumatran tiger is the only surviving species of the Sunda Islands tigers that once included the now-extinct Bali tiger and Javan tiger.
It has been listed as critically endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List since 2008.
An official estimate from the Environment and Forestry Ministry up to December 2018 stated that the Sumatran tiger population stood at 600.