Customer Reviews

How the Tiger Lost Its Stripes: An Exploration into the Endangerment of a Species

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Meacham has presented a wonderfully clear picture of a complicated issue without resorting to sentimentality or hype. He describes the international efforts and the machinations of the organizations involved in tiger conservation. In his dissection of the issues and roadblocks of saving a species, Meacham also gives us a portrait of the tiger: its value and role in both society and the environment. Meacham's writing style, with its informal and sometimes humorous twists, makes for fascinating reading. I'd insist this is a must not only for those interested in tigers, but also for anyone trying to understand the complexities of global conservation activities.

A book that doesn't give us any easy answers. Because there aren't any. Conservation unfortunately is against the rising tide of our population, given that Meacham tries to detail the options, some of which aren't so romantic but they are options none the less.

If you have your heart set on rhetoric don't buy this book. If you are more open an objective view of the reality of conservation, buy this book.

Mr. Meacham offers a pragmatic, fact-filled presentation and I have to agree with everything he writes. Having read everything on tigers from Barnes to Zwaenepoel, were I to read "Tiger-Wallahs" again by Geoffrey Ward, in the next edition I would add Mr. Meacham on that list. He interviews tiger conservationists and discusses would-be healers and gurus and their medicine (Aryuveda, e.g.), poachers and sellers of tiger parts in traditional eastern medicine. His book compelling journey into the workings of tiger farms for slaughter, its cooperation with the tiger part trade, and surprisingly he reveals that an inadvertent degree of coziness is involved between the Save the Tiger Fund and the practice of tiger farming! Meacham makes no pretense to be a zoologist but does inspire one to want to BE one. And no, as he begins his book, the tiger is not endangered--zoo and captive tigers, that is. The wild tiger in his glory is endanagered. He goes into more detail about CITES and the validity of the tiger-saving organizations. This guy is "not ready to make nice" and he's telling it like it is.

This is a waste of time for anybody who really cares about tigers.I recommend Schaller's "The deer and the Tiger", Sy Montgomery's "Spell of the Tiger" and "Tigers in the snow" by Peter Matthiessen for some good tiger books. DONT BUY THIS BOOK, if you want to read it take it out from your library, its not worth the money.

The first thing you must notice when you are reading this book is that Cory J Meacham is a journalist, not a zoologist. In the book he constantly talks about killing, euthanizing and even hunting the tigers, that the book (in my opinion) starts to get a wee bit morbid. He dosent talk about planing the birth of tigers in zoos, in a sort of conservation sence but rather that births just happen. So his solution was insted of puting a little effort in and planing the births of the tigers we should just let them mate whenever and then euthanize the cubs. He dosent talk abut collectivising the villages and settelments around tiger reserves,and land distribution issues concerning tiger reserves. Also he talks very little about anti-poaching patrols and how effective they can be as we have seen with rhinos in Kaziranga.