![\"Panthera\u2019s](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/WEFCOM-Tigers-27.jpg\")
Panthera\u2019s tiger team checks a camera trap in the Si Sawat Non-Hunting Area in November 2025.<\/p>\n
Tigers today are a shadow of their former selves. Over the past century, the species has been decimated by hunting and habitat loss, pushing the animal into just 7% of its historic range. The situation in Southeast Asia<\/a> has been especially dire, with the extirpation of the Indochinese subspecies in Cambodia<\/a> and Laos<\/a> in just the last decade.<\/p>\n But, biologists say, the situation could be worse. In October, the IUCN, the global wildlife conservation authority, published an assessment<\/a> of Panthera tigris that took stock of recent conservation actions \u2014 painting a fuller picture<\/a> beyond just the big cat\u2019s globally endangered status. The report found that while tigers as a whole are critically depleted, they would be in worse shape if not for herculean conservation efforts. Without such measures, tigers today would be considered critically endangered, instead of endangered.<\/p>\n \u201cThe tiger is completely reliant upon conservation,\u201d says Luke Hunter, executive director of the Wildlife Conservation Society\u2019s Big Cats Program and lead author of the IUCN assessment. \u201cIt needs big landscapes. It needs investment in these landscapes. It needs really targeted conservation interventions.\u201d<\/p>\n He adds, \u201cWe\u2019re kind of dead in the water unless there\u2019s government commitment to it.\u201d<\/p>\n In 2010, the global tiger population fell to an all-time low of around 3,200 individuals. Since then, the population has rebounded to an estimated 5,574<\/a> as of 2023, according to data from the Global Tiger Forum. Much of that success has been seen in India<\/a>, Nepal<\/a> and Russia<\/a>, thanks to strong antipoaching efforts and habitat restoration. But Thailand, too, has emerged as a unique success story in an otherwise declining region, with as many as 223 tigers now living in its wilderness. The country is finally beginning to see payoffs for its investments.<\/p>\n \u201cThailand\u2019s department of national parks has for a couple of decades put serious resources into tiger conservation and protection of tiger landscapes,\u201d Hunter says. \u201cBut tigers don\u2019t recover overnight. It takes a long time \u2014 in some cases it\u2019s a 20-year process.\u201d<\/p>\n Recent successes, he says, prove \u201cyou can bring tigers back. You can catalyze recovery. And we\u2019re still in the early stages of it in most places, but we see it\u2019s possible.\u201d<\/p>\n In Thailand, the tiger\u2019s comeback is largely playing out in a region known as the Western Forest Complex<\/a>, or WEFCOM. The largest remaining tract of forest in mainland Southeast Asia, WEFCOM encompasses 17 contiguous protected areas<\/a> that span an area roughly the size of Kuwait. It begins just a three-hour drive northwest of Bangkok and sweeps hundreds of kilometers toward the border with Myanmar.<\/p>\n To date, the tiger\u2019s recovery<\/a> in this green oasis \u2014 a mix of dry evergreen forest, dipterocarp forest, deciduous forest, and grassland \u2014 has largely unfolded in the region\u2019s upper reaches, far away from the villages, roads and tourist fare that intrude on southern WEFCOM. Millions of conservation dollars have flowed into the core conservation area \u2014 largely Thung Yai Naresuan-Huai Kha Khaeng Wildlife Sanctuary \u2014 through nonprofits like WCS and WWF working to bring the tiger back from the brink.<\/p>\n The region\u2019s tiger population has more than tripled in response, increasing from a low of just 40 tigers in 2007 to more than 140 of the big cats prowling WEFCOM today. But as tiger numbers grow, space is getting tight in the jewel of WEFCOM\u2019s crown.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s natural that when we have new tigers, the young tigers will have to find their territory,\u201d says Kristana Kaewplang, director of Panthera Thailand. \u201cThey will come down, because it\u2019s already crowded in the core. It means we have to prepare for that.\u201d<\/p>\n In 2014, scientists first discovered tiger tracks in Salakpra Wildlife Sanctuary \u2014 a sign that at least one intrepid animal had ventured 100 km (60 mi) south of Huai Kha Khaeng. Vital to the tiger\u2019s expansion, scientists say, is the Si Sawat Corridor \u2014 a 350-square-kilometer (135-square-mile) once unprotected area owned by Thailand\u2019s Treasury Department and used by the Royal Thai Army for military drills. This corridor, which skirts the eastern side of Sinakharin Reservoir, connects upper WEFCOM to the south, chiefly Salakpra Wildlife Sanctuary.<\/p>\n Until recently, there were no protections for tigers here. But through camera traps, big cat biologists could point to tigers using the corridor. For more than a decade, they worked to conserve the Si Sawat Corridor, with the movement gaining traction in 2021 when Panthera received a nearly $1 million grant from the Rainforest Trust to help protect Si Sawat and an adjacent extension site, closing the gaps in tiger habitat.<\/p>\n Finally, in August 2023, the Thai government agreed to designate the corridor as a non-hunting area, transferring jurisdiction to the Department of the National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation. Unlike national parks and wildlife sanctuaries in Thailand, which enjoy a higher degree of protection, non-hunting areas still allow for public access and human activities, but prohibit hunting of any kind. Killing tigers was, of course, already forbidden, but the designation would help to protect their prey<\/a>: sambar deer (Rusa unicolor), gaur cattle (Bos gaurus), wild boars (Sus scrofa) and muntjac deer (Muntiacus spp.). Large infrastructure projects and land conversions are also banned under NHAs.<\/p>\n Since the protection of Si Sawat, individual tiger detections in southern WEFCOM have soared, jumping from 20 in 2021 to 54 this year, says Rattapan Pattanarangsan, Panthera Thailand\u2019s conservation program manager. A former wildlife veterinarian, Pattanarangsan began working with the nonprofit after treating dozens of tigers rescued during the 2016 Tiger Temple scandal<\/a>.<\/p>\n Panthera is now working with the government to also declare an additional 140-km2 (54-mi2) extension site as a non-hunting area, widening the tiger\u2019s path. That process, it says, is about 30% complete.<\/p>\n One male tiger is even using Si Sawat as part of his home range. More critically, Pattanarangsan says, \u201cfor the most recent year, we found that now the tigers are reproducing in south WEFCOM. It used to be the sink. But now we are the source.\u201d<\/p>\n In late 2023, a camera trap picked up three new tiger cubs<\/a> in south WEFCOM. Scientists suggest the lower ranges could permanently support about 47 tigers, with an estimated 26 tigers currently living in the area.<\/p>\n \u201cBut that is why we are worried,\u201d Pattanarangsan says. \u201cBecause compared to the core WEFCOM we have high human density [in the south]. The young and stupid tigers move around. The older tigers are wise.\u201d<\/p>\n Somnuek Sawatchotidet, 72, has lived in the forests of Si Sawat his entire life. Two years ago, while walking through the forest about 10 km (6 mi) from his home in the village of Ong Sit, he glimpsed a tiger.<\/p>\n \u201cI was around a bee\u2019s nest. The nest fell and [the tiger] was eating the small bees,\u201d Sawatchotidet recalls, sitting on the porch of his wooden home. \u201cI wasn\u2019t scared. I felt like we were friends.\u201d<\/p>\n Sawatchotidet says he\u2019s seen many tigers throughout his life, especially when he was young, traveling with his father through the forest. Once, in his childhood village of Na Suan, a tiger killed someone\u2019s pig and the villagers killed the tiger in revenge. Its carcass was left to rot because tigers were so common at the time that they were seen to have little value, he says.<\/p>\n But since then, tigers \u2014 and their prey \u2014 have become scarce. Sawatchotidet says he used to hunt small mammals for food in the forest, and only stopped after his son became a ranger with the national parks department.<\/p>\n Sawatchotidet says he\u2019s happy about having more tigers in the landscape; he says he hopes they\u2019ll be able to control the elephant population \u2014 a common refrain among those living in the Si Sawat area. \u201cSometimes they eat the baby elephants,\u201d he says. \u201cTigers have principles. If we don\u2019t bother them, they don\u2019t bother us.\u201d<\/p>\n When it comes to coexisting with wildlife, Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) are the core concern for people living near WEFCOM. In Si Sawat, sweeping fields of maize abut the forest, with elephant patrol towers stationed every few hundred meters for farmers to keep watch over their crops at night. Every so often, someone is gored or trampled<\/a> by an elephant in Kanchanaburi.<\/p>\n Because wildlife management in Thailand is governed in part by Buddhist beliefs, the national parks department won\u2019t kill elephants deemed by locals to be a problem. Tigers, villagers say, might be able to do the job instead.<\/p>\n \u201cKaren people have certain beliefs not to [harm] the tiger,\u201d says Panthera\u2019s Pattanarangsan. \u201cEven if a tiger eats your cattle, nothing is done. This is favorable for the tiger.\u201d The challenge, he adds, is that the Karen people, a diverse ethnic group, also rely on consuming animals from the forest, often the same prey as the tiger\u2019s.<\/p>\n With Si Sawat officially protected from hunting, the focus now is to boost the tiger\u2019s prey to sustain a growing southern population.<\/p>\n At a newly constructed ranger checkpoint in the Si Sawat Corridor, Prawut Prempree, the national parks department\u2019s founding chief for the area, lays out his vision for the future. A half-dozen rangers mill around the bunkhouse and kitchen, fresh off their latest antipoaching patrol through the forest.<\/p>\n \u201cWe try to look through the eyes of animals. If we think about what tigers want the most and what sustains them, it is prey,\u201d Prempree says. \u201cIf we look through the eyes of the prey \u2014 deer, gaur and banteng \u2014 we must consider the forest conditions they need to thrive.\u201d<\/p>\n Prempree has championed the Si Sawat Corridor from within the government for more than a decade; in many ways, this is his life\u2019s work. Hunched over a large map of WEFCOM, he describes the next steps to make the tiger feel at home in the southern part of the range.<\/p>\n In northern WEFCOM, conservationists have been breeding sambar deer in captivity and releasing them into the core of the habitat for years. In 2024, the department began to do the same in southern WEFCOM, starting up a five-year project. So far, Prempree says, about 20 sambar have been released into the area\u2019s forests. But those animals were trucked in from breeding stations in other provinces. Banteng (Bos javanicus), a species of wild cattle closely related to gaur, are also being reintroduced into Salakpra Wildlife Sanctuary.<\/p>\n Prempree says he hopes to one day have a sambar breeding center and reintroduction program located within southern WEFCOM. In the meantime, Panthera has found that populations of smaller tiger prey are still increasing. The abundance of wild boar, lesser mouse-deer (Tragulus kanchil) and two species of muntjac deer were all found to be increasing in recent surveys in the area.<\/p>\n Reflecting on the work to protect this corridor, Prempree says he is grateful for Karen peoples\u2019 willingness to coexist with the forest and the animals.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m touched by the condition of the forest and how fertile it is,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n \u201cHigher tiger numbers \u2014 that is our hope.\u201d<\/p>\n Banner image: Previously undetected in other protected areas, a tigress known as SWT001F was the first individual tiger captured on camera in Thailand\u2019s Sisawat Non-Hunting Area in 2024. Panthera, Thailand\u2019s DNP and other partners are working to monitor and protect Indochinese tigers and their prey in this region where camera traps have shown tigers are using Sisawat forest as a corridor. Currently plans exist to propose the adjoining forest area to the east as an extension of Sisawat. Image by Panthera.<\/p>\n Citations:<\/p>\n Ash, E., Cushman, S. A., Kaszta, \u017b., Redford, T., & Macdonald, D. W. (2025). Can Southeast Asia\u2019s tigers break free? The connectivity, constraints, and recovery of the region\u2019s remaining tiger populations. Animal Conservation. doi:10.1111\/acv.70021<\/a><\/p>\n Duangchantrasiri, S., Sornsa, M., Jathanna, D., Jornburom, P., Pattanavibool, A., Simcharoen, S., \u2026 Karanth, K. U. (2024). Rigorous assessment of a unique tiger recovery in Southeast Asia based on photographic capture-recapture modeling of population dynamics. Global Ecology and Conservation, 53, e03016. doi:10.1016\/j.gecco.2024.e03016<\/a><\/p>\n Phumanee, W., Steinmetz, R., Phoonjampa, R., Weingdow, S., Phokamanee, S., Bhumpakphan, N., & Savini, T. (2021). Tiger density, movements, and immigration outside of a tiger source site in Thailand. Conservation Science and Practice, 3(12). doi:10.1111\/csp2.560<\/a><\/p>\n Jornburom, P., Duangchantrasiri, S., Jinamoy, S., Pattanavibool, A., Hines, J. E., Arnold, T. W., \u2026 Smith, J. L. D. (2020). Habitat use by tiger prey in Thailand\u2019s Western Forest Complex: What will it take to fill a half-full tiger landscape? Journal for Nature Conservation, 58, 125896. doi:10.1016\/j.jnc.2020.125896<\/a><\/p>\n Simcharoen, A., Simcharoen, S., Duangchantrasiri, S., Vijittrakoolchai, C., & Smith, J. L. D. (2021). Exploratory dispersal movements by young tigers in Thailand\u2019s Western Forest Complex: The challenges of securing a territory. Mammal Research, 67, 21-30. doi:10.1007\/s13364-021-00602-6<\/a><\/p>\n ![\"In](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/TWT130M_SSW_AU36_a_2020-04-04_08-10_f.jpg\")
In 2020 a tiger was found by camera trap at Sisawat Non-Hunting area. He was identified as TWT130M, a tiger that traveled from the north. This finding showed us that tigers use the Sisawat Non-hunting area to move south to the southern part of the Western Forest Complex (WEFCOM). This image served as important evidence demonstrating how important this region is to tiger conservation and movements. Image by Panthera.
\nThailand\u2019s success with its top predator<\/p>\n![\"HKT197F](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/HKT197F.jpg\")
HKT197F in the Salakpra Wildlife Sanctuary. HKT197F is a tiger from the Huai Kha Khaeng Wildlife Sanctuary that has moved down to live in the Salakpra area. Image by Panthera\/DNP.<\/p>\n![\"Panthera\u2019s](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/IMG_1160-1.jpg\")
Panthera\u2019s Rattapan Pattanarangsan discusses the protection of Thailand\u2019s southern Western Forest Complex at a new ranger checkpoint in Si Sawat Non-Hunting Area.<\/p>\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/TWT128Cub.2.jpg\")
The cubs of tiger TWT128F playfully running around in the Salakpra Wildlife Sanctuary. Image by Panthera\/DNP.
\nOf tigers and elephants<\/p>\n![\"Tigers](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/WEFCOM-Tigers-23.jpg\")
Tigers traverse the grassy ridgelines of Si Sawat Non-Hunting Area, which overlook Sinakharin reservoir.
\nFuture tigers \u2014 and prey<\/p>\n![\"Male](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/SWC005M.jpg\")
Male clouded leopard SWC005 in the Sri Sawat Non-Hunting Area roams in search of food at night. Image by Panthera\/DNP.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n