More dead tigers in India

There's more bad tiger news from India. Nine tigers have died in Kaziranga National Park, in Assam, in the past few weeks.

Kaziranga is one of eight new tiger reserves established by the Indian government over the last year. They were created in reaction to a grim report documenting a stunning 60 percent drop in tiger numbers from just five years ago: At most 1,411 tigers—perhaps as few as 1,165—still inhabit the country, marking an all-time low.

Kaziranga was considered to be one of few places in India where the cats are safe from poachers. Apparently not, although some of the deaths were attributed to natural causes.

Read more about the state of tigers in India in my recent article: Tigers in the Tank: Can we halt the decline of India's big cats before it's too late? It's the cover story in the current issue of Defenders Magazine.

Killing the Endangered Species Act

In his last days as President, George Bush is trying to ram through sweeping changes to the 35 year-old Endangered Species Act that will essentially gut protections for dwindling species. The proposal would hand decisions on potential dangers to wildlife and ecosystems over to the agencies in charge of implementing new development projects, a complete hen-in-the-chicken-coop move. Especially given a recent ethics investigation that discovered Interior Department employees cavorting with the oil company representatives they buy Gulf oil leases from--having sex with them, smoking pot and doing coke with them, accepting thousands of dollars worth of gifts from them.

And these are the people that are supposed to look at a new drilling project, a new dam, new roads, a new mine and decide if it will endanger threatened species--people with a vested interest in getting their project going, people who have traditionally chafed over US Fish and Wildlife reviews, people with no expertise whatever in wildlife or biology.

This week, the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works has been hammering the Administration on this and a slew of other environmental travesties wreaked over the last years. Let's hope they exert enough pressure on the Interior Department to force them to withdraw this unconscionable proposal.

Read my syndicated editorial for more info.