🤯 Did You Know (click to read)
Tigers avoid heavily disturbed edges, effectively shrinking usable habitat beyond visible deforestation lines.
Deforestation and infrastructure expansion in Peninsular Malaysia have fragmented once-continuous tiger habitats. Logging roads carve deep corridors through rainforest, creating access for poachers and separating breeding populations. Even narrow clearings alter prey movement patterns and increase human disturbance. Tigers that once roamed uninterrupted forest now encounter plantations, settlements, and highways. Fragmentation reduces effective territory size without visibly shrinking forest cover maps. What appears intact from above may be functionally divided on the ground. Habitat compression directly limits how many breeding adults can coexist.
💥 Impact (click to read)
When territories are split, males may no longer overlap with sufficient females to reproduce. Smaller habitat patches also support fewer prey animals, increasing starvation risk. Road networks allow vehicles and hunters to penetrate deeper into forest interiors. Fragmentation multiplies threats simultaneously.
Landscape connectivity projects aim to restore corridors between forest blocks. Wildlife overpasses and protected corridors can reconnect genetic flow. Without re-linking fragmented habitats, even well-guarded reserves may become ecological islands too small to sustain a top predator.
Source
International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List
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