Ask The Tiger and Conservation Experts

Dale Miquelle Ph.D

Country Coordinator, Wildlife Conservation Society

Born and raised near Boston, Massachusetts, USA, Dale Miquelle received a Bachelor of Science degree from Yale University, a Master’s of Science degree from the University of Minnesota, and a Ph.D. from the University of Idaho. Dr. Miquelle spent a year working on the Tiger Ecology Project in Chitwan National Park, Nepal, which cemented his interest in both international conservation efforts and large carnivore research. Dr. Miquelle joined the Hornocker Wildlife Institute to launch the Siberian Tiger Project, a cooperative research and conservation effort between international and Russian experts, with a long-term research program based in Sikhote-Alin Biosphere Reserve, Primorski Province, Russia. Dr. Miquelle has spent 16 years in the Russian Far East, studying tiger ecology and applying the lessons learned to implement effective conservation actions. Now country coordinator for the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Russia Program, Miquelle coordinates WCS research and conservation actions both in Russia, and nearby China, where efforts are underway to restore and recover tigers in the Changbaishan landscape.

John Seidensticker, Ph.D.

Head of the Conservation Ecology Center in the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute at the Zoological Park and Chairman of Save The Tiger Fund Council

John Seidensticker, Ph.D., is a Conservation Scientist and Head of the Conservation Ecology Center in the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute at the Zoological Park in Washington, D. C.; serves as Chairman of the Save The Tiger Fund Council, is Affiliate Professor of Environmental Science and Policy in the Department of Environmental Science and Policy, George Mason University, Fairfax VA; and serves as Independent Advisor on the Global Tiger Initiative for The World Bank.

As a conservation scientist at the Smithsonian's National Zoological Park, Dr. Seidensticker's research efforts have focused on understanding and encouraging landscape patterns and conditions where large mammals can persist, training future conservation leaders, and diffusing environmental understanding through his writing, public appearances, and museum and zoo exhibits.

He has been a member of the IUCN-World Conservation Union's Cat Specialist Group since 1974, a professional fellow of the American Zoo and Aquarium Association since 1989, a member of the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation's Save The Tiger Fund Council since 1995, and its chairman since 1997.

Dr. Seidensticker has traveled widely in Asia and served as an ecologist and park planner for the Indonesia World Wildlife Fund Program. He has also conducted fieldwork in the Sundarbans of Bangladesh and India, in Thailand, Nepal, and in Sri Lanka. He authored or co-authored The Javan Tiger and the Meru-Betiri Reserve: A Plan for Management; Sundarbans Wildlife Management Plan: Conservation in the Bangladesh Coastal Zone; Saving the Tiger; The Future for Wild Tigers; and co-edited Riding the Tiger: Tiger Conservation in Human-dominated Landscapes. Most recently, he co-authored with Susan Lumpkin the Smithsonian Book of Giant Pandas, Giant Pandas, Cats: Smithsonian Answer Book, and Smithsonian Questions and Answers: Cats.

He pioneered the use of radio telemetry to study the mountain lion in North America and wrote his Ph.D. dissertation on Mountain Lion Social Organization in the Idaho Primitive Area. As founding principal investigator of the Smithsonian-Nepal Tiger Ecology Project, he was co-leader of the team that captured and radio-tracked the first wild tigers in Nepal.

Dr. Seidensticker is author or editor of more than 180 articles and books, including the widely acclaimed Great Cats; Dangerous Animals; Tigers; Predators, and Cats and Wild Cats. His avocations include traveling, walking, gardening, and photography.

He was raised on a cattle ranch in Montana and studied at the University of Montana and the University of Idaho, where he received the 1998 Distinguished Alumni Silver and Gold Award.

Eric Dinerstein, Vice-President

Conservation Science, World Wildlife Fund:

Dr. Eric Dinerstein is senior scientist at the World Wildlife Fund where he started working in 1991. He began his conservation work in 1975 as a Peace Corps volunteer in Nepal, where he conducted a census of the tiger population in the Karnali-Bardia Wildlife Reserve. He has pioneered the approach of protecting species and their habitats at the larger landscape level. An 18-year veteran of WWF, Dr. Dinerstein has helped develop strategies to protect a number of endangered species including one-horned rhinos, tigers and elephants. He also led an unprecedented effort to identify every ecoregion on the planet and define the most biologically important species. Known as the Global 200, it serves as a framework that guides WWF's fieldwork in more than 100 countries. He spends tremendous amount of time in public education.

Dr. Dinerstein obtained his Master’s and PhD degrees from the University of Washington and has a post-doctoral degree with the National Zoo.

Hariyo T. Wibisono, Senior Manager

Indonesia Program, Wildlife Conservation Society

Hariyo “Beebach” Wibisono has been working as a field scientist and a conservation manager since 1993. Beebach holds a master degree in Wildlife and Fisheries Conservation, Department of Natural Resources Conservation from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He has researched topics related to population and ecology of large mammals, especially Sumatran tigers. Beebach has held several positions with leading conservation institutions, mostly with the Wildlife Conservation Society Indonesia Program. He is one of very few Indonesian experts in large mammal survey techniques and has provided training for various organizations. He has spent much of his time working with community members and fellow conservation professionals – government forestry staff, NGO conservationists – to explore innovative ways to conserve wildlife and their habitats. Beebach is a leading expert at WCS-IP on Sumatran tigers and large mammals, having led field teams and WCS-IP professional staff, and initiated several major projects of the organization since 1998. At the WCS-IP, he served as the Deputy Director of between 2002 and 2003. Today, he leads the WCS’ Tiger Forever initiative in Sumatra, WCS-IP’s island-wide survey for large mammals in Sumatra, and serves as chair for the HarimauKita, the Indonesia Tiger Conservation Forum, which is made up of 70 tiger conservationists from 15 major organizations working to save the Sumatran tiger.

Mahendra Shrestha

Program Director, Smithsonian Tiger Conservation Partnership
Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute

Born in the eastern Himalayas of Nepal, Mahendra was raised in a small farm village close to the forest. He received his M.Sc. in Zoology from the Tribhuvan University in Nepal and then diploma in forest management together with officials of the Indian Forest Service in Dehradun, India before joining the forest service and later national parks service in Nepal where he worked for 15 years. Later he pursued his master’s in Conservation Biology at University of Wisconsin, Madison with a Fulbright Scholarship and received a Ph.D. from University of Minnesota for his research on relative ungulate abundance and its implications for tiger conservation in the Terai Arc Landscape in Nepal and some cross-border protected areas in India. He brings extensive hands-on experiences in reserve management, community engagement, research, wildlife policy, and close working relationship with the government and NGO partners in tiger range countries. From his current position, as the Director of Save The Tiger Fund of National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, he promotes collaboration of key stakeholders in tiger range countries with better understanding to develop and implement best management practices and developing local leadership to sustain viable populations of large carnivores like tigers in priority landscapes in Asia.