Since October 2006 a joint team comprising WVI, the Russian Academy of Science’s Institute of Biology and Soil Sciences (IBSS), WCS-Russia and Zoological Society of London (ZSL) has been trapping wild leopards and tiger in Southwest Primorsky Krai for radio-collaring and medical evaluation. Trapping a huge male tiger when the intended quarry is the planet’s rarest leopard might seem an odd thing to celebrate. But as a careful approach revealed the snared big cat, the international trapping team working in Russia’s sub-zero temperatures in autumn 2011 knew their hard and dangerous graft was paying off.

Screening and monitoring of Amur tigers is vital as the world’s biggest tiger species will be sharing territory with Amur leopards in the planned Amur leopard re-introduction programme. The next job for WVI’s John Lewis was to get the tiger quickly and safely anaesthetised, health checked, data collected, radio collared – and released! Within days they were celebrating again, with the capture of another, equally large male Amur tiger and two Asiatic bears. Since October 2006 a joint team comprising WVI, the Russian Academy of Science’s Institute of Biology and Soil Sciences (IBSS), WCS-Russia and Zoological Society of London (ZSL) has been trapping wild leopards and tiger in Southwest Primorsky Krai for radio-collaring and medical evaluation. With Russian field vet Misha Gonchuruk (ZSL) also on the expedition the first steps have been taken to give Russian Far East its own wildlife veterinary capacity.