African Leopard
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| Panthera pardus pardus |
The leopard's dimensions and weight vary widely within its large distribution area. In general, forest-dwelling leopards are usually smaller and stockier, those of the open habitats are usually slimmer and larger. The leopard is 90–190 cm long, not counting the 60–110 cm long tail. Male leopards weigh around 40–90 kg and have a shoulder height of 70–80 cm. Females are around half the size and weigh only around 30–60 kg. Small females measure only 18 inches at the shoulder. In the Cape region in South Africa, leopards often weigh only 20–30 kg.
The coat pattern is often very different depending on the subspecies, but individual differences also occur within one area. The fur almost always shows rosettes, which are arranged in rows, especially in the longitudinal direction of the back. On the chest and lower neck, instead of rosettes standing side by side, strawberry spots are often found, which are arranged in one direction and act like collars. At the top of the long tail, the rosettes continue along the center line. Towards the end of the tail, the rosettes become less and less pronounced, but can sometimes merge into several transverse rings. The underside of the tail is very light to white towards the end. The belly and the upper inside of the legs are also free of rosettes and colored white, yellowish-white or turning gray. Farther towards the paws, there are full stains that get smaller and smaller towards the bottom. There are also only black full spots on the head and upper neck and neck. Forest leopards are generally more intensely colored than leopards in open landscapes.
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| Source: Wikipedia |
The ears are rounded. The sense of hearing is well developed. Leopards can perceive very high frequencies of up to 45,000 Hertz that humans can no longer hear. The eyes are directed forward and have a wide overlap of the fields of view. This enables them to have excellent spatial vision. During the day, the eyesight of a leopard is roughly the same as that of a human, but at night the leopard has five to six times better eyesight: leopards can open their round pupils very wide so that more light can enter their eyes; furthermore, like all cats, leopards have a reflective layer behind the retina, the so-called tapetum lucidum, which increases the light output by reflecting back. The sense of smell is also excellent.
Historically, the leopard was widespread across Africa on both sides of the Sahara and across large parts of Asia. In Africa he lives in the central rainforests as well as in the mountains, savannas and semi-deserts from Morocco to the Cape of Good Hope. The leopard only avoids the large, waterless deserts and is therefore naturally absent in the Sahara and the driest regions of the Namib. In Asia he lives in the coniferous forests on the Amur as well as in the tropics of India and Southeast Asia. Here it penetrates in the southwest to the Arabian Peninsula, to Israel and Anatolia and in the southeast to the island of Java. However, it is missing on Sumatra and Borneo, as well as in the waterless core deserts of Asia, such as the Rub al-Chali. However, fossil finds show that the leopard once inhabited Sumatra as well. The northern border of the Asian distribution area runs today from the Caucasus via northern Persia, Afghanistan and Kashmir, along the Himalayas to the Amur River in eastern Siberia. In prehistoric times there were leopards in Central Europe. But here they disappeared at the end of the Ice Age. The leopard has the largest range of all seven big cats.
In many areas, however, leopards are now extinct. These include Morocco, the Sinai Peninsula and the island of Zanzibar. In other regions, such as the Caucasus and the Amur region, extinction can hardly be prevented. The Arabian Peninsula has fewer than 250 free-living, fully grown individuals in fragmented populations, of which 50–100 are in Oman (2013). The numbers in Anatolia and Palestine are even lower. According to estimates by WWF, just under 50 individuals survive in the Caucasus, and great efforts are currently being made to protect them.
In Iran and Turkmenistan only a few hundred specimens of the Persian leopard live, in Pakistan and Bangladesh leopards are also very rare today. In China, leopards are almost only found in isolated remnants. In contrast, it is estimated that around 14,000 leopards still live in India.
Most leopards now live in Africa, south of the Sahara. Here the number of leopards is estimated at up to 700,000 (as of 1988).
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| red - common, purple - uncertain, spotted - possibly extinct, pink - extinct . |
What leopards eat depends primarily on the food available in the respective habitat. Leopards have an extraordinarily wide range of prey, ranging from beetles to reptiles to birds and large mammals. If at all possible, however, leopards try to prey on mammals weighing between 30 and 50 kilograms. Mostly these are medium-sized ungulates. Depending on the region, its main prey animals are deer such as axis deer and sika deer or antelope species such as sasins, schirrantilope or impala. Smaller predators such as mongooses or jackals make up a relatively large part of its diet. But he also dares to attack such well-fortified animals as wild boars, bush pigs, porcupines and baboons, which he usually attacks under cover of night. Zebras are already too big to prey on, but occasionally it will tear a careless foal from these equidae.
Usually leopards are seen as nocturnal hunters, but no general preference for certain hunting times has been found so far. The timing of a hunt is probably related to the availability of the prey in its hunting area.
Basically, one can observe two principally different ways of hunting with leopards: the sneaking hunt and the more passive stalking hunt. Sneak hunting is one of the most common hunting methods used by the leopard. Leopards are quick to set off and can overcome several meters in just a few leaps, but even at medium distances, most prey are faster than them. The cat therefore tries to get as close as possible to its victim unnoticed in order to shorten the distance before the attack. When sneaking up, leopards often perform enormously. In the Kalahari and other barren desert regions, they have to sneak up on their victims over enormous distances with almost no cover. Pure ambush hunting, in which the hunter waits for his victim, is also a hunting method that can often be observed with leopards. Leopards that spend the day in trees often use them as a raised hide. With remarkable patience, they allow appropriately sized herds of grazing animals to pass or graze by themselves or occasionally directly under their lookout. If the branch the leopard is resting on is not too high, it can jump straight onto its prey from above. Most of the time, however, it leaves the tree before the actual attack. To do this, he carefully climbs down the side of the tree that is not visible to the chosen victim and looks for cover behind the trunk or - if available - behind other dense vegetation. After a very long waiting time on a branch of the tree, they can spend the same time at the foot of the tree to wait for those animals that they have observed from above over a long period of time approaching the tree in question. There are no observations or reports as to whether leopards choose their prey at the beginning of the sneak or hide hunt, or whether they leave it to chance which animal in a group they want to kill.
Occasionally, the robber just looks for its prey while roaming around the area and surprises you. Fawns lying apart from horned bearers or rabbits huddling motionless against the ground are often discovered purely by chance in passing, and not sneaked purposefully.
Leopards are also content with carrion or drive weaker predators, such as cheetahs, from their rift.
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| Source: Wikipedia |
Leopards are typical loners. The roaming areas of neighboring female leopards sometimes overlap considerably. The much larger ranges of male leopards can overlap with those of several females. According to a study in the Kruger National Park, males occupy around 16–96 square kilometers and females 5–30 square kilometers, depending on the density of prey. [6] In very barren, loot-poor regions, the home areas can be a lot larger. The territory is marked and defended against same-sex conspecifics under threat behavior and, if necessary, in territorial combat behavior. A territory owner can secure the privilege of access to sexual partners, but also to sources of food, watering places, shady places and cover options.
First and foremost, leopards mark their territory with urine and feces, but also acoustically with their characteristic sawing - a sound that is reminiscent of wood saws. In addition, they also visually mark the boundaries of the territory with scratches on trees or on the ground. On the one hand, the marking has the function of keeping conspecifics away and informing other animals about the presence of the territory owner, on the other hand, it also serves to structure the home area. Odor marking makes it easier to find your way there.
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