Shooting Tigers

(CBS)  This segment was originally broadcast on Nov. 19, 2006. It was updated on July 8, 2007.

There were tigers, once, that ranged wild from Siberia to India, up to 100,000 of them. But not now: the world has gone from 100,000 to 5,000. And a recent, surprising discovery suggests that time is running out for the tigers that survive.

No one understands the decline of the tiger better than Belinda Wright, an Indian woman of English descent, who's famous for shooting tigers – photographing them. Her daring encounters made her one of the great shooters, in fact, the first woman photographer at National Geographic. Correspondent Scott Pelley wanted to find out what's driving wild tigers to extinction so 60 Minutes asked Wright to take our team into the jungle.

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Belinda Wright calls tigers her religion. For her, shooting pictures for National Geographic in the 1980's was like a form of worship.

The word "tiger" comes from Greek, meaning "arrow." Here's why: tigers hit 35 miles an hour. They're among the most powerful hunters on land or in water. Wright photographed one taking a 250 lb. deer, defying hungry crocodiles, and swimming the beast back to shore.

"I think the most extraordinary thing about tigers is they're solitary. So a sick tiger, a weak tiger, a physically disabled tiger, is a dead tiger. So every tiger you see has to be absolute perfection," Wright explains.

Belinda Wright grew up in India, in "tigerland," so for her our trip was a homecoming. The 60 Minutes crew started out in the capital, New Delhi.

Asked to describe where the crew would be heading, Wright explains, "If you put a pin into the middle of India, that's where we're going. It's right in the heart, in the center of India and in many ways it's the most magical part of India, too."

The team rolled to a tiger reserve called Kanha in the state of Madhya Pradesh, 18 hours from Delhi, southwest of the Ganges, riding on rails that reach back as long and as straight as the arrow of time.

At the end of the track, the team ran into Hindu tradition, called Rama Navami, a holiday to celebrate renewal and drive out evil.

For Hindus, the tiger is a supernatural force. One God rides a tiger to show that she dominates the most powerful thing on earth. It's their power that makes tigers the ultimate trophy for God and man.

60 Minutes found the Kanha Reserve at the end of the road. It seemed to the team like the Garden of Eden. It's one of India's 28 official tiger reserves, and it's the jewel in the crown. It's one of the few reserves where tigers are still safe and there's still plenty of prey for them to hunt. This is the jungle of Kipling's "Jungle Book," the tale of a boy who slays a tiger.

When Kipling was writing about this jungle, it was a little over 100 years ago. It was the era of the great tiger hunt. One Indian maharaja is said to have killed 1,200 tigers himself. These tiger hunts would go on for weeks and as many as 100 tigers would be taken in a single hunt. These days, in the Kanha Reserve, there only about 100 tigers left.

Before 60 Minutes could search for those last tigers, Belinda Wright insisted on washing her "SUV." It's a 1967 model, with an ample trunk. She calls her "Tara" and in reality, the SUV is an elephant.

In India there's no better vehicle for crashing through the jungle on a tiger hunt; the elephants will go through anything, tearing out brush with their trunks.

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[Edwingro]

This was a fascinating and important program, and you are to be commended for it.

There was one glaring inaccuracy, however. How could you claim that Belinda Wright was "the first woman photographer at National Geographic?" Harriet Chalmers Adams had 21 stories printed in the magazine from 1907 to 1935.

The first female staff photographer at National Geographic was Kathleen Revis, who was hired in 1953. Over the next decade she illustrated many wonderful articles, covering long hikes over the Cascades, Rockies and White Mountains that her male counterparts could not have done.

An excellent photographer, Jodi Cobb, has been on staff since the 1970s.

Edwin Grosvenor

[Edwingro]

This was a fascinating and important program, and you are to be commended for it.

There was one glaring inaccuracy, however. How could you claim that Belinda Wright was "the first woman photographer at National Geographic?" Harriet Chalmers Adams had 21 stories printed in the magazine from 1907 to 1935.

The first female staff photographer at National Geographic was Kathleen Revis, who was hired in 1953. Over the next decade she illustrated many wonderful articles, covering long hikes over the Cascades, Rockies and White Mountains that her male counterparts could not have done.

An excellent photographer, Jodi Cobb, has been on staff since the 1970s.

Edwin Grosvenor

[cbswhiteout]

The Old Conservative (aka racist) way of doing things at CBS like the 60 mon story about the Rwandan Tragedy..rears it's ugly head again. Valmik Thapar an native Indian has truly dedicated his life to protecting the tiger more than anyone in India.

But to make the story more interesting the reporter and producer of this piece had to find a white knight for the story, so here comes Belinda Wright. We only heard a tiny sound bite from Valmik Thapar as Ms Wright was being praised to the highest for here work.

Is CBS truly the network of the Klansmen. You seem to have a white supremist attitude when doing stories?

[emccoy24]

I think it is hard for any group of people to change what they have become accustom to since the beginning of time. However, my question to the Chineese with regards to their use and willingness to pay to pay for tiger "parts" would be: "What will you do when tigers are extinct and they are no longer available for you to exploit?"

India needs to make it less lucrative for the poachers & distributors by making the protection of tigers more lucrative. Unfortunately, it always comes down to the all mighty dollar. There is no sense of right and wrong anymore.

[stopher2475-2009]

Here is how you fix the problem. Shame them. Make them so embarrassed to be seen with a tiger skin that they would not think to do it. This will kill the demand in China. Look at how culturally they see having more than one child is selfish. Use this same principal for animal conversation. Put out a series of commercials in China that show how anyone who needs to wear a tiger skin or eat tiger bones is an ignorant caveman. Laugh at them to their face and watch how quickly they conform to the new social norm.

[bawana69]

I have posted 3 times and 3 times my posts have been deleted. What's up with that? Is it that you only allow posts you want to hear? I only voiced my opinion on this subject, I didn't swear or call anybody names, so what gives? Leave my posts alone in the future.

Getting back to the tigers, leave those people in their own countries. Every wonder why the rest of the world hates Americans? It's situations like this, sticking our noses into other people's lives to change things a4roubnd to our liking. How would you feel if the people of India went on a campaign to stop Americans from eating beef because it's against their(the Indians) religion? You wouldn't. So get off this joke of saving the tigers, the poachers more than likely need the money.

The Whole

[barbandbelle]

Thank you 60 minutes for airing this program. Extinction of the wild tiger is an unbearable concept. Unconscionable, unbearable, unthinkable. If we allow the extinction of this magnificant creature, we will have lost ourselves as well.

Please provide us with contact information for Valmik Thapar (I see someone posted the information for Belinda Wright already) so that we can personally thank him for his lifetime passion, commitment, and so that we can donate money to his effort.

Thank you,
Barbara Peterson, NYC

[aaptwo]

For people who want to do something to save the tiger and other endangered wildlife/marinelife here are a few links:
World Wildlife Fund (WWF): http://www.worldwildlife.org/ http://www.panda.org/
Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS): http://www.wcs.org/
Wildlife Protection Society of India (WPSI): http://www.wpsi-india.org/
Join wildlife groups at http://www.care2.com/

Though the administration of the National Parks in India and other countries bears a responsibility for protecting the tiger and wildlife, so do Giant Corporations like ExxonMobil who use the symbol of the Tiger. They have enormous resources to help. Please read and sign this petition to get more funding for Tiger and biodiversity conservation:
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/214374227

Thanks
aaptwo

[buckjones4-2009]

And with this realization the dazzling flash of the once great cats, the tiger will someday no longer walk among the emerald - green jungle leaves of its homeland but will instead become a memory of the past...

One of God's great creatures who would be remembered as a shameful experience as many have already witnessed the murders of this great cat; yet out of respect and perserverance there are some who fight on to save this great creature of God... Like Joseph Vattakaven...

The shimmering - bursting tiger, exuberant - exhilarting... assessing its fate, its situation from a high vantage point, even a young tiger in a treetop in sight... make no mistake about it man is motivated by his need to be superior, by his selfishness, to make this world his own...

Its so very difficult to believe that this can happen in this day and age... under it all is our pretense and our hypocristy; under all the *** about love for animals... commpassion; but all that I see today is murder, killings and have to admit that I am repulsed by the killings of the great cats...

it just breaks my heart to see what is happening to this sparkling beauty who moves among the moonlight; among the jungle nights whispers like...

Before the sunless - moonless somber upon the twilight brings mankind to its knees... Stand - up all people and make it known that we will not tolerate the loss of our great cats the tigers...


Thank you,
Steve Trimboli

[peacenow2]

You can help Belinda Wright save these tigers by donating through her website:

http://www.wpsi-india.org/wpsi/index.php