The three Siberian tiger cubs Kuzya, Borya and Ilona, released by President Vladimir Putin into the wild at the Zhelundinsky nature and wildlife reserve in the Amur Region a week ago, are now exploring their new home.

Scientists of the Severtsov Institute of Environment and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences are tracking the animals with the help of satellite collars, which started transmitting data on the cubs’ location immediately after their release.

Specialists working at the site of the release receive data on the tigers daily from the Severtsov Institute. They are also training their colleagues from the wildlife management agency in the Amur Region to take over responsibility for monitoring the cubs’ movements.  

Another two tiger cubs, Svetlaya and Ustina, will be released into the wild soon. Over one year ago, a female tiger named Zolushka was released at the Bastak nature reserve after undergoing rehabilitation. An adult male tiger who entered the reserve has been courting  Zolushka, and scientists hope that they will mate.  

The Amur tiger population, which had been completely wiped out by humans by the 1950s in the northwest of its habitat in the Amur Region and Jewish Autonomous Area, is now being restored by the Severtsov Institute of Environment and Evolution, with the support of the Russian Geographical Society, as part of the programme to research the Amur tiger in Russia’s Far East. The group is led by Vyacheslav Rozhnov, associate member of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

The Severtsov Institute is working with other organisations that protect rare animals to rehabilitate orphaned tiger cubs and release them back into the wild. The cubs are treated at the Rehabilitation and Reintroduction Centre for Tigers and Other Rare Animals in the Primorye Territory, which was built by the Severtsov Institute and the Tiger Special Inspectorate with the support of the Russian Geographical Society.