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A tiger peers at a camera trap it triggered while hunting in the early morning in the forests of northern Sumatra, Indonesia. Tigers can thrive in many habitats, from the frigid Himalaya to tropical mangrove swamps in India and Bangladesh.
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These men were apprehended in January 2011 while trying to sell a tiger skin near Chandrapur, India. Illegal trade in tiger bones, eyes, whiskers, penises, teeth, and other parts for Asian "cures" may generate up to five million dollars a year.
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A poacher's snare cost this six-month-old cub its right front leg—and its freedom. The limb was amputated after the tiger had been enmeshed for three days in a snare in Aceh Province, Indonesia. Unable to hunt, the tiger now lives in a zoo on Java.
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Two veterinarians and a ranger hold a tiger cub after amputating its leg. The cub had been trapped in a snare in Aceh Province, Indonesia. In addition to wire snares, poachers use box traps, guns, steel-jaw traps, electrocution traps, and poison. Usually used for poaching wild pigs or deer, snares occasionally catch tigers by accident.
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A tiger leaps for a plastic bag tied to a pole while tourists watch at the controversial Tiger Temple in Kanchanaburi, Thailand. Visitors can pay to bottle-feed cubs, walk with tigers, and pose for photos with animals chained to the ground.
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A forest once stood here, and Sumatran tigers hunted wild pigs and deer in its glades. As forests are cleared for oil palm plantations, like this one near Longkib, Indonesia, tigers migrate in search of wild prey—or target farm animals.
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A tiger slips through a fence at India's Bandhavgarh National Park, a refuge that may be too small to support the nearly 60 cats living there. Gaps in the fence let tigers go outside to hunt but also let villagers in to poach deer—and occasionally tigers.
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Relatives prepare a man for cremation after he was killed by a tiger in the Indian village of Tala. The tiger had left Bandhavgarh National Park to hunt, and park employees were trying to herd it from Tala. One swipe of a paw felled this villager.
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Meet Smasher—the male in the background. That's the name Steve Winter gave this youngster, cooling off in a watering hole in Bandhavgarh National Park, after he slapped the automated camera trap until it stopped clicking. Both tigers are thought to have killed people, and Smasher is now in captivity.
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Saksit Simcharoen, a Thai researcher, puts his ear to the belly of a pregnant tiger, listening for fetal heartbeats. After measuring, weighing, and fitting the sedated tiger with a radio collar, the team will release her back into the wild.
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Back off! seems to be one cub's message to the other in India's Bandhavgarh National Park. Around the park encounters between tigers and humans can be fatal: These cubs are both thought to have killed people during the past year.
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Indonesian poachers use a barking puppy as bait to lure tigers into a trap.
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Members of the Smart Patrol search for poachers in Thailand's Western Forest Complex, habitat for up to 200 tigers but able to hold hundreds more. The patrols use handheld global positioning systems to map illegal activity.
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A mother rests with her two-month-old in Bandhavgarh National Park, where—contrary to the global trend—managers have built up tiger numbers. Compensation for loss of life caused by cats outside the park gives villagers some consolation.
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A zoo cage is no haven for a creature whose body parts are prized in the illegal trade. Dara Arista, eight, holds a photo of Sheila in front of her cage at the zoo in Jambi, Indonesia. Poachers had slaughtered the tiger during the night.
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One moment this Bandhavgarh tiger was snoozing in the shade. The next, says Steve Winter, he charged "like a shot out of a cannon." Winter, who was photographing perched on the windshield of his open-top Jeep, jumped back down into his seat. The tiger veered off.
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A tiger burning bright is captured by a camera trap on a tree in India's Kaziranga National Park.
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In Bandhavgarh National Park, a cub bats at a remote controlled camera car photographer Steve Winter used to document tigers in action.
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