Tigers are disappearing from Southeast Asia. A forest in Thailand is offering new hope

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CNN —

As Global Tiger Day rolls around, there’s good news for the big cats in Thailand.

The tiger population in the country’s Western Forest Complex (WEFCOM) — an 18,000-square-kilometer (6,950-square-mile) area of forest encompassing 11 national parks and six wildlife sanctuaries — is estimated to have more than tripled between 2007 and 2023, from 41 to 143.

The remarkable comeback was observed in a new collaborative study led by Thailand’s Department of National Parks (DNP) and the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), newly published online in the scientific journal Global Ecology and Conservation.

It’s not just tigers bouncing back: a companion study, published alongside the tiger assessment, found that populations of threatened ungulate species — hoofed mammals like deer and wild cattle, that are the main prey for the tigers — have doubled in Huai Kha Khaeng Wildlife Sanctuary, one of three protected areas, along with Thung Yai East (TYE) and Thung Yai West, in the forest complex.

Tigers spotted on camera traps in Thailand's Western Forest Complex (WEFCOM)

This increase reflects “more effective management” of the forest and is the result of more than a decade of conservation interventions, says Pornkamol Jornburom, director of WCS Thailand and one of the wildlife biologists working on the new study.

“This forest complex is the home of many endangered species,” says Jornburom. She hopes WEFCOM can be “a