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Solutions & Good News Active Updated Aug 8, 2026

Kazakhstan brings the tiger back after seventy years

A decade of rebuilding prey populations and habitat at Kazakhstan's Ile-Balkhash Nature Reserve has led to the release of an Amur tiger named Hope, the first tiger to roam wild in Kazakhstan since the native Caspian tiger went extinct there more than 70 years ago. The stakes are whether Hope, a captive-bred male, and two cubs can establish a self-sustaining wild population in an unfenced reserve, which would make Kazakhstan the first country to fully re-establish a big cat in the landscape it vanished from.

The story so far

  1. Aug 8, 2026 Latest

    A female Amur tiger named Hope was released into Kazakhstan's unfenced Ile-Balkhash Nature Reserve, fitted with a GPS collar, after a decade of reforestation and rebuilding prey species including Bukhara deer, saiga antelope and kulan. A male named Amur remains captive until he proves he can hunt on his own, and two cubs from Russia's Khabarovsk Reserve will grow up semi-wild until they are tested for release around 18 months old.

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