Known by the name of Javan Tiger”, this was a beautiful feline which became a tiger subspecies known as recently extinct. Its scientific name is Panthera Tigris Sondaica. Its origin is a little bit uncertain, due to it is naturally from Java; on the island have been founded primitive tigers fossils from the Panthera Tigris Trinilensis species (ancient felines that liven on the island above 1,2million years before); the Javan tiger isn’t a descendant from this ancients, because apparently this species felines came to the island from Indonesia between the final period of the Pleistocene and the begin of the Holocene, from a north region poorly defined. Nowadays the Javan tiger is a species that can only be appreciated in its fossils exhibitions or dissected animals exhibitions.
The Javan tiger remembers, for its body constitution, to the Sumatran tiger, just with the discrete difference that its fur is darker and with stripes more by the end, silvers colored and very abundant, that exhibited a uniform distribution about the stripes on the flacks and the back; the thinness of these stripes made the stripes number were more abundant than of any other subspecies of the nowadays tiger. Also, about its characteristics, the fur on the cheeks of the Javan tiger was long, describing a kind of beard, unmistakable of the other breeds.
Though, these feline measures were the smallest compared with other tigers. The males’ weight was among 220 and 330 pounds, and had a length of 2.45 m; by her side, the females had smaller measures, with weight among the 154 and 264 pounds, and a length among 2m.
Also, the Javan tiger was very known and popular by the medium of the XIX Century, when its natural habitat at the Java island started to populate more and more with humans, deforesting woods and occupying the space, that was these tigers home, to the production of humans goods as agriculture and other activities. Likewise, the Javan tiger became in the target of many hunters which trafficked with the skins of these beautiful animals.
All those things made an impact on the ecosystem and in consequence, made a big impact on the tiger’s population of the island. As the humans expand, this feline became more and more undesirable, y in just over 100 years, it was already in danger of extinction, so for medium of the XX century the records showed a total tiger population of Javan tigers among 20 and 50 exemplars, which were dispersed all over the territory without any possibilities of them for being cared and protected. By the year 1960 the famous natural reserve of the Java Island, the Ujung Kulon National Park, saw disappeared the Javan tigers that habited in there.
For a while, this species was considerate as extinct, but in 1972 in a mountain region at the southeast of Java known as Meru Betiri, some exemplars were found, the reason why the area became in one extremely protected. Nevertheless, the impact was already devastating for the species, and by the beginning of the ’80s, it was seen for the last time the footprints of these tigers until in 1994 it was officially declared as an extinct species.
The extinction declaration of this tiger’s subspecies has to be seen as a serious alert of the human intromissions impact in natural ecosystems.
By now, some genetic studies have been made, and these identify the Sumatran Tiger (P. T. Sumatrae) as part of the same subspecies of the Javan tiger; however, the agreement between the scientists isn’t uniform, so there could be two different species and not a subspecies.