We invite you to our home at TIGERS Preserve in beautiful Myrtle Beach, SC.
"Swim, Swing, Soar with our Tigers, Apes, Eagles & More!"
Make your family's vacation reservations today!
Learn how you can meet these animal ambassadors, plus 100 more, at the world's most interactive wildlife experience:
www.myrtlebeachsafari.com
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Rare Species Fund
The Rare Species Fund
compliments the educational messages and field research of T.I.G.E.R.S.
To help in this life-changing cause, please visit
Considered to be "the greatest hands-on animal experience in the world", the Preserve transports you out of coastal South Carolina and straight to the savannas of Africa and the jungles of South America!
The VIP Wild Encounter Tour always contains a wide variety of exotic animal ambassadors that you will get to see and interact with. Cubs of various sizes, young apes, ligers and a whole assortment of others will be on display while visiting our Preserve located only minutes from Myrtle Beach.
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Save
$50 |
If you have your photo taken at Preservation Station during the 2015 season you will receive a $50 discount on your T.I.G.E.R.S. Preserve tour! Preservation Station is located at Barefoot Landing in North Myrtle Beach.
| | Offer Expires: 10/10/2015 |
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TWC Visits Myrtle Beach Safari
Bubbles welcomes film crew to Myrtle Beach's
" best kept secret"
Named the 2014 "Top Summer Destination" by TripAdvisor, Myrtle Beach boasts over sixty miles of shoreline, hundreds of restaurants, over 100 championship golf courses, and a myriad of entertainment options and world-class attractions. It's no wonder Jim Cantore and The Weather Channel wanted to broadcast LIVE from the Myrtle Beach Boardwalk! With so many places to see, where would The Weather Channel crew spend their time? Click on the video above to find out!
Each year, the Myrtle Beach Safari, T.I.G.E.R.S. Preserve, and T.I.G.E.R.S. Preservation Stations creates new and innovative ways for each member of your family to get a "feel" for these rare and endangered animals. Each and every time you visit you will create new memories and learn about the newest conservation efforts taking place here and around the world.
Find out why The Weather Channel designated the Myrtle Beach Safari as a "must-see" for anyone visiting the Grand Strand. We would like to invite you to visit Preservation Stations at Barefoot Landing in North Myrtle Beach or take the "Wild Encounters" tour at our 50-acre preserve, home to over 100 animals including tigers, monkeys, wolves, falcons, and Bubbles the elephant. Throughout the tour, the Safari staff will be taking professional quality photos and videos allowing you to relive and share this once-in-a-lifetime encounter. T.I.G.E.R.S. and the Rare Species Fund have provided more than $200,000 to wildlife conservation efforts in Africa, Asia and the Americas. Money from photos, tours and gift shop sales goes directly to grassroots wildlife programs and to help support researchers in the field.
Innovative Program Protects Cheetahs
Livestock Guarding Dog Program : 20 years of success!
One of the grassroots international wildlife programs assisted by the Rare Species Fund is the Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF) located in the African country of Namibia. Today's article will describe this phenomenal organization and their innovative idea of introducing livestock guarding dogs to help ranchers and cheetahs co-exist. The information below was written by Maryann Mott for National Geographic News.
The decades-old effort is the brainchild of Laurie Marker. The U.S. biologist moved to Namibia in 1990 to help prevent livestock losses that spurred ranchers to shoot and kill hundreds of cheetahs each year. Since 1994 the Livestock Guarding Dog Program has trained more than 450 Anatolian shepherds and Kangal dogs to protect farmed sheep and goats in Namibia. The powerful shepherds weigh 110 to 150 pounds. Unlike most other breeds used to herd sheep and goats, the dogs instinctively challenge predators and scare them off with their loud, booming bark.
Local governments in Namibia allow farmers to trap and kill predators, including protected species like cheetahs, if livestock is threatened. Farmers say such steps are necessary since cheetahs can quickly kill dozens of sheep in unguarded pens known as kraals.
Twenty years ago farmers in Namibia shot as many as 800 to 900 cheetahs annually, according to Marker. Today she estimates just 200 cheetahs are shot and killed each year in the country, thanks in part to her guard-dog program and related educational efforts.
A cheetah expert, Marker first traveled to Namibia in 1977 to learn if a cheetah born and bred in captivity in the United States could hunt in the wild. It was then that Marker said she first became aware of the threats farmers and cheetahs posed one another. Namibia is home to an estimated 3,000 cheetahs, the most of any country. The figure represents one-fourth of the estimated 12,000 cheetahs (current estimates state less than 10,000 cheetahs) left in the world. Conservationists view Namibia as one of the last few strongholds for the endangered species.
Marker discovered that many cheetahs were killed as a preventative measure, a practice handed down among generations of farmers. Compounding the problem was the fact that cheetahs are daytime hunters and not aggressive toward humans, making them easy targets for farmers. During subsequent trips to Africa in the 1980s, Marker realized that the cheetah population was rapidly declining and that something had to be done to save them. So in 1990, she changed the focus of her work.
Quitting a job she held for 16 years studying and breeding captive cheetahs at a U.S. wild-animal park, Marker moved to Namibia, in southern Africa. There she created the Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF), a nonprofit research and education center, veterinary clinic, and farm. "In the beginning many farmers wondered what I was doing here," Marker wrote in an e-mail interview with National Geographic News. "Some of the farmers would say, 'Oh, if you like cheetahs, take them all back to the U.S. with you.'" Marker said she quickly told the farmers she wasn't going back to the U.S., so they were stuck with both her and the cats. "This usually got quite a little laugh from them," she said.
Marker interviewed farmers about their work and problems encountered with predators in order to develop a program around the needs of the community. "They liked my approach. I was not confrontational," she said. "I was interested in them as farmers."
Some farmers Marker spoke with used herding dogs. But when the dogs saw danger, they instinctively tried to move the animals to safety, triggering the cheetah's natural instinct to stalk and chase. Ironically the dogs were causing more sheep and goats to be killed as a result.
Marker set out to find another type of dog that would protect rather than herd the animals. During her research, she came across the Anatolian shepherd, a breed used by Turkish shepherds for thousand of years as the first line of defense against predators. The canine's formidable height (they stand 27 to 29 inches tall) can help intimidate predators. The dogs live with their flocks and are independent thinkers, needing little direction to do their jobs. Their short coats are also well suited to Namibia's hot climate.
With their instinctive guarding ability, Anatolia shepherds and Kangal dogs have successfully warded off more than cheetahs on Namibian farms: jackals, caracal, lynx, leopards, and baboons have been turned away. The Anatolians and Kangals are bred at CCF's headquarters. About 25 are placed on farms each year. There is no fee to obtain a dog. However, commercial farmers are asked for a U.S. $100 donation to cover the cost of vaccinations and neutering or spaying.
Once a dog is placed, CCF staff members contact its new owner every month for half a year to answer questions and offer advice. After that, regular contact is made with the owner throughout the dog's life. Since the program started, Marker said most participating farmers have reported zero loss of livestock and high satisfaction with their dogs' performance. Currently the program has a waiting list of more than 50 farmers. In an e-mail interview, Hannes de Haast, a sheep and cattle rancher who joined the program almost three years ago, says his Anatolian is an invaluable asset.
"I don't want to think what could have happened without her on the farm," de Haast said. He notes that every year disease, accidents, and predators (principally hyenas and cheetahs) can cull three to four out of every hundred animals on farms that raise small livestock, like sheep or goats. De Haast said that in the course of 15 years of farming, his only loss of livestock to cheetah predation were six sheep killed in a single day nearly a decade ago. However, de Haast, said he finds cheetah tracks on his land five or six times a year. 
Within the last few years, de Haast said he has noticed a "sharp increase" in the local cheetah population. Marker said other farmers have too, and some of them are nervous. "We have more work to do," Marker concedes. "As farmers see more cheetahs, they think that they might have more problems. So we spend our time in a vicious circle of hand-holding and educating."
Meanwhile Marker looks to the future, saying she hopes younger generations will peacefully coexist with cheetahs through adaptive livestock and wildlife-management practices. Word about the Livestock Guarding Dog Program has spread. Researchers working to save wolves in United States, snow leopards in Nepal, jaguars in Brazil, and European lynx in Switzerland, have expressed interest in using Anatolians as a conservation tool, Marker said.
"This is an art along with a science," Marker said of saving the wild cheetah. "Today the future of the cheetah is in human hands."
Bring your family together to learn about this and many more of the world's pioneering conservation efforts. Visit Myrtle Beach Safari and be part of a tiger running at full speed or swimming across a clear pool, great apes sliding through a jungle canopy, an elephant just a breath away. Discover the excitement of helping to preserve these magnificent animals for generations to come. There is something unique about being in the presence of tigers and other beautiful creations of nature. Allow us to transform the way you see yourself and the world around you forever. Learn more about conservation efforts for chimpanzees, lynx, elephants, tigers, ligers, orangutans, gibbons, apes and more through the Rare Species Fund. To see these amazing species up close and personal, visit www.myrtlebeachsafari.com/signup to get started on your own interactive tour!
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Reservations can be made NOW to take part in our tenth anniversary season! As you can imagine, this year will have special events and many ways to connect with TIGERS Preserve and the Rare Species Fund. Book your family's tour today and be part of the 10th anniversary experience. 
T.I.G.E.R.S. Preserve and T.I.G.E.R.S. Preservation Stations were created as a wildlife education organization dedicated to promoting global conservation. With informative, educational and entertaining interactive programs, Dr. Bhagavan Antle has created a once-in-a-lifetime experience! Dr. Antle, Director of T.I.G.E.R.S., works closely with international wildlife conservation projects in North America, South America, Africa and Southeast Asia.
To make reservations over the phone, please call 843.855.2699 or click here.
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