A smile that verged on tears, and then they parted
Over the last century, 98pc of the world’s tiger population has been wiped out, first by big game hunters, and latterly by poachers, who kill these magnificent creatures and hack them to pieces.
And for what? Well, money, for one thing. The rarer tigers become, the more valuable they are to the poachers, who sell their bones and organs on the black market for traditional Chinese medicines. (…) which is said to have aphrodisiac qualities. (…)
Scientific studies have shown that the claims made for tiger penises are, if you’ll pardon the expression, bollocks. But so far that’s failed to prevent the carnage escalating.
There are only a few thousand tigers left in the wild. They could well disappear off the face of the planet within 10 years.
