Sumatran tiger blamed for killing two people is captured alive after marathon hunt

JAKARTA — Authorities in Indonesia have captured a Sumatran tiger blamed for killing two people earlier this year. They have moved the female tiger, nicknamed Bonita, to a wildlife rehabilitation center in West Sumatra province. The capture of Bonita on April 20 in Riau province marked the end of the “longest rescue and evacuation effort for a Sumatran tiger in history,” according to Wiratno, the director-general of natural resources and ecosystem conservation at the Ministry of Environment and Forestry. The hunt for the critically endangered Sumatran tiger (Panthera tigris sumatrae) lasted 107 days. It began after the first reported killing, on Jan. 3, when the tiger attacked three workers at an oil palm plantation in Riau’s Indragiri Hilir district. The tiger killed one of the workers, identified as Jumiati, 33, after she fell from a tree that she had climbed up to escape the animal. The animal remained elusive, and struck again on March 5, when it reportedly killed a 34-year-old man, Yusri Efendi, who was passing through the same palm estate, run by the Malaysian company PT Tabung Haji Indo Plantations. The ministry’s team finally managed to take down the tiger after hitting it twice with tranquilizer darts. Its goal was to capture the tiger alive, amid mounting protests from locals rattled by the two deaths, who threatened they would otherwise “kill the beast” themselves. An adult male Sumatran tiger captured by camera trap. Image courtesy of WWF-Indonesia and Ministry of Environment and Forestry. “Rescuing this Sumatran tiger has grabbed the special…

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