Tigers survive in fragmented patches of habitat across Asia. Conservation efforts must consider both population-level recovery and the welfare of individual tigers navigating human-dominated landscapes.
Wild tigers face welfare challenges from habitat fragmentation, snares, and human conflict. Tigers attempting to move between habitat patches cross roads, agricultural land, and human settlements, facing road mortality and conflict with communities protecting livestock. Snare injuries cause prolonged suffering — a tiger caught in a wire snare may struggle for days before dying or being found. Retaliatory killings use a variety of methods depending on availability, including poison, which causes slow death. Camera trap studies show tigers in fragmented landscapes traverse dangerous terrain repeatedly, representing chronic stress exposure. Livestock-depredating tigers are often removed and relocated, which causes territorial stress and elevated mortality in a species with strong site fidelity.