Newborn Siberian Tigers Greet Tourists in East China

The four Siberian tigers born April 25 at the Chengshantou Nature Reserve in the city of Rongcheng, east China's Shandong Province, have ventured out to greet tourists this week.

The four cubs, three male and one female, are the offspring of a five-year-old mother and a six-year-old father.

This is the couple's second time to have cubs in the nature reserve. They had two male cubs in 1997.

The four new tigers now weigh about 2.5 kg each; they weighed 1. 15 kg each at birth.

The Siberian tiger, mainly living in northeast China and Russia, is an endangered wild animal under State-level protection in China. There are only about 300 wild Siberian tigers in the world today. The World Wildlife Fund has listed the animal as one of the world' s 10 most endangered species.

Chengshantou Nature Reserve has nearly 100 species of animals, including tigers, black bears and macaques.



People's Daily Online --- http://www.peopledaily.com.cn/english/