Six tigers, which have been kept by a family in the northern province since 2005, were handed over to the Hanoi Wildlife Rescue Center on Wednesday.
Experts from the rescue center had evaluated the health of the tigers two months ago before devising rescue plans.
Three male and three female tigers were kept inside five cages, each 3 m high with a total 300 m2 of space. The animals were not tagged with chips.
The tigers were lured into cages to protect their rescuers.
"It's costly and takes a lot of efforts, but it's the safest way for the tigers to be rescued. Previously, rescuing tigers involved sedating them, but doing so in this hot weather would be risky," said center director Luong Xuan Hong.
Nguyen Khac Thuong, who owns the tigers, used chicken as bait to lure the tigers to the backyard, where the cages waited for them. He feeds and cares for the tigers every day.
"For nearly 20 years, I have treated them as my own children. But I'm getting older and my health is no longer stable, so our family has decided to voluntarily hand over the tigers to a trustworthy place, so they could be raised for the rest of their lives," he said.
Workers combine smaller cages together to create a path for the tigers to enter more specialized cages.
Despite the workers using beef and chicken to lure the tigers into the cages, the animals were for hours too anxious to follow the bait. Workers patiently waited for them.
At around noon, the first tiger decided to enter the cage. The high heat and the presence of many strangers made the tiger stressed, and it paced around the cage several times.
The design of the cages makes it so that once the tigers enter it, they cannot move around enough to endanger the rescuers.
Workers cover the cages with dark covers to help the tigers feel less stressed.
The tigers were docile and friendly to humans, so their transportation was easy.
The first tiger cage was loaded onto a pickup truck equipped with ice to help combat the heat during the trip back to the rescue center.
Four tigers have been rescued so far. Rescuers are waiting for the other two more anxious tigers to calm down before transporting them.
The journey would take around 1.5 hours.
Tigers are taken away from a family in Thai Nguyen Province to be transported to Hanoi Wildlife Rescue Center, June 7, 2023. Video by VnExpress/Ngoc Thanh
