Story By: John Feng, Sub-Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Asia Wire Report
AsiaWire / QMNNR
This footage shows a rare wild snow leopard mother and her three cubs captured together in front of an infrared camera trap at a Chinese national park.
According to the Qilian Mountain National Nature Reserve, it is the first time its researchers have captured on record a family of four snow leopards (Panthera uncia) together at the same time.
Snow leopards are solitary cats which are only briefly seen together during mating season, and when mothers rear their cubs.
The park is located more than 3,000 metres (9,800 feet) above sea level on the Tibetan Plateau in Aksay Kazakh Autonomous County, which is in China’s north-western province of Gansu.
The camera trap that managed to record the rare sight was set up inside the nature reserve by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) in 2019, reports said.
In the footage dated 10th October 2019, a female snow leopard can be seen to the left of the frame, while all three of her cubs linger together in the foreground.
According to the park, staff members were reviewing footage from the past year when they came across the video this week.
The cubs, which researchers say are no older than six months, will remain with their mother for between 18 to 22 months.
They will learn key survival skills, allowing them to become independent and take over their own territories in the high-altitude mountains where they live.
County forestry official Li Zhilong reported: “While organising the footage we had collected, an infrared camera captured for the first time ever a family of four snow leopards together.
“Other animals recorded by the camera including lynxes, wolves and argali.
“The statistics show that the environment inside the Qilian Mountains is improving year on year, leading to an increase in animal numbers.”
Snow leopards are vulnerable, according to the IUCN Red List.
There are believed to be around 4,500 individuals left in the wild.
Mother snow leopards in captivity are shown to give birth to between two to three cubs every season, but in the wild, the number varies and is dependent on other environmental factors.
The ViralTab page is created by and dedicated to professional, independent freelance journalists. It is a place for us to showcase our work. When our news is sold to our media partners, we will include the link here.
