How conservation breeding programmes for tigers can be managed with welfare as a co-equal priority.
Tiger conservation and welfare are inseparable in zoological settings. The large space requirements, complex environmental needs, and solitary social structure of tigers make their welfare in captivity genuinely challenging. Facilities that provide large, varied enclosures with multiple zones, naturalistic substrate, denning areas, and enrichment that engages predatory behavior can maintain tigers with good welfare indicators. Those that house tigers in small, barren enclosures produce animals with chronic psychological stress and poor welfare regardless of their conservation value. Conservation success requires healthy, behaviorally normal animals — so welfare and conservation are aligned.