This photo is a evidence of wild tigers in Bhutan, the mountain kingdom nestled in the Himalayas in between India and the Tibet, has been captured in a camera trap set at high altitude and released today by WWF to mark Global Tiger Day 2017.
With only around 100 tigers in the wild in Bhutan, these images verify that the endangered big cats are actively using stretches of land that connect protected areas - ‘wildlife corridors’ - stressing the need to protect them.
The images were captured by photojournalist and filmmaker Emmanuel Rondeau who undertook a three month expedition in Bhutan to capture images of wild tigers.
He faced torrential downpours, snowfall, high altitudes and extreme terrain to capture images of a tiger in a wildlife corridor - with the goal of demonstrating these corridors are used by tigers moving between protected areas in Bhutan.
There were thought to be around 100,000 wild tigers at the beginning of the 20th century, and now there are only around 3,900.
Hunting and habitat loss have been key drivers of this overall population decline, and over more recent years, poaching habitat loss and deterioration have continued.