Video collections
Year of the Tiger
A video collection highlighting the tiger's plight and a celebration of their beauty and majesty.
2010 is the Year of the Tiger, a zodiac sign associated with power, passion and courage, yet these majestic animals remain under threat from human activity.
Once found across much of Asia, tigers have disappeared from over 90% of their historic range over the past century. There may be as few as 3,402 wild tigers left, with recent estimates suggesting under a thousand scattered over the last 'strongholds' of India and fewer than 40 in China. Once the region's top predator, tigers continue to face challenges imposed by poaching, retributive killings and habitat loss.
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19 video clips in this collection
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Land of the Tiger
Will future generations enjoy the sight of tiger cubs at play?
In Kanha National park, the young tiger cubs featured in Land of the Tiger are growing up fast. Their mother has done a good job of keeping them safe so far, but what of their future? The tiger is often seen as the symbol of Indian heritage, but changing culture has threatened the place the tiger holds in people's lives. The battle is on if our children are to be able to enjoy delightful sights like these satisfied, well looked after youngsters at play.
Tigers enshrined
Land of the Tiger
Hope for the tiger's survival may lie in religious belief.
Buddists believe In the endless cycle of death and rebirth, where man and animal are inextricably entwined. In Land of the Tiger, Valmik Thapar tells the story of how the Buddha gave his life to save a starving tigress and her cubs. Does the pervading influence of religious belief offer hope to the tigers across Asia?
Holding on
Saving Planet Earth
Threats from human activity put the tiger's fate firmly in our hands.
Newsreader Fiona Bruce was chosen to champion the tiger's cause for Saving Planet Earth and was utterly captivated by the beautiful tigers of Bandhavgarh National Park, India. But with tiger numbers dwindling fast as a result of human activities, experiences like hers could sadly be a thing of the past. With their fate in our hands, will we allow that to happen?
Tiger plight
Saving Planet Earth
The planet's most potent conservation symbol.
Instantly recognisable, tigers are the iconic Asian species. Their distinctive striped coats help them slip into the undergrowth and almost disappear, and sadly they really are disappearing from the wild at an alarming rate. In the last century alone we have lost 95% of the world's tigers through direct poaching and loss of habitat. In Saving Planet Earth, David Attenborough introduced the tiger and gave an overview of the problems tigers face in today's world, before the rest of programme explored the issues in more detail.
Moving majesty
Lost Land of the Tiger
A tiger's roar sets an emotional tone for George McGavin's musings on the big cat's future.
Despite being an expert on insects, after filming this sequence, George McGavin confessed: 'At heart, I'm very definitely a man who loves the world's unloved creatures, and I still maintain that ants are the planet's major carnivores. But being this close to a tiger is just incredibly impressive.'
Animals in this collection
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Tiger
The magnificent tiger, largest of the big cats, is a heavily muscled, powerful predator...
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