Leopards: Variations, Characteristics and Evolution
Leopards often have different fur colors due to the environment that they are living in. Snow leopards have evolved over time to make their fur color lighter with a white under belly and a grey coat on top. Compared to the African leopard, it has a much lighter coat whilst the African leopard has a darker coat to blend into the environment more. Most of the time species of animals have variations due to graphical location, which then affects surroundings, weather, pray etc. African leopards do no need much water and can survive of just the moisture from their pray, unlike snow leopards who need more moisture due to the wetter environment they are living in water is more available. The Sri-lankan leopard is a leopard subspecies that is native to Sri Lanka. The leopard possesses a tawny or rusty yellow coloured coat with close-set rosettes and dark spots. The Javan leopard they are either completely black due to a recessive phenotype or have the usual spotted coat. The Javan leopard is critically endangered, and only about 250 individuals survive in protected habitats in their range. The Indochinese leopard is native to southern China and mainland Southeast Asia. Like most other wildlife in the region, the leopard faces threats due to habitat loss and poaching for illegal wildlife trade. The Amur leopard is critically endangered and there are only a few left in the whole world. These are only a few leopard species and it shows how diverse they are with habitats and appearance. This image is what an African leopard looks like in its natural habitat of Arica.
Like many other animals’ leopards began to diversify about 50 million years ago. The formal name used for animals that are and are similar to the leopard is Panthera genus. The Panthera Blythae is thought to be the oldest common ancestor which lived about 6 million years ago. Some close relatives to the leopard include felines such as the tiger, lion and jaguar. Leopards have changed over time in order to adapt for example to oldest living leopard lived in the Himalayas, but over time leopards have spread to different regions with different climates. The snow leopard is the closest type of leopard compared to the Panthera blytheae, due to location and colour. Most feline cats that exist eventually branched of from one species millions of years ago. This is an explanation for why lions, and tiger enjoy swimming but for leopards it is not such a big fuss. This shows that possibly because of the different habitats that lions and snow leopards, for example, live in it is why they do not enjoy swimming as much.
Most of the time species of animals have variations due to graphical location, which then affects surroundings, weather, pray etc. Droughts in parts of Africa have greatly affected lots of animals including leopards this has forced them to go longer without water therefor enhancing their ability to live in Africa. Hunting and poaching in Africa is a huge problem. Leopards are often caught in metal traps set on the floor, so they are unaware. This is a
great problem, but it has also sharpened leopards hunting senses and forces them to be more cautious. Leopards have spread out over geographical location due to an increase of domestic livestock. Snow leopards have been forced further and further up the mountains due to an increase in a demand for domestic livestock and the farming that it requires. Some scientists believe that leopards spread so far out geographically due to characteristics from other leopard ancestors before the Panthera blytheae. This is because many of the bone fragments found from Panthera blytheae do not match with todays lions and other feline cousins. So they believe that there must have been a type of species before that species that somehow related to the African leopard to make it withstand these heats unlike the snow leopard which is known to be directly related to the Panthera blytheae. This image shows a drought in Africa forcing leopards to go days without water.
Over time leopards have accommodated many traits and have kept some and gotten rid of others. The Amur leopards coat is very unique and has spots that help it blend with the snow and the trees. Unfortunately, this has made them very valuable to illegal poachers and is causing them to almost be extinct. Leopards have very sharp canine teeth to help them sink their teeth into their pray. The oldest known leopards to live, the Panthera Blytheae, is proven to have a number of characteristics. A very important characteristic for a leopard to have is their night vision. This is because during the night is when they do most of their hunting as it is harder for many other animals to see.
The male is generally larger and heavier than the female. The average male leopard weighs around 63 kilos and the average female weighs 37 kilos. You can tell the difference by the tracks. The bottom, larger set of tracks are of a male, and one can see the more rounded edges of the rear pad. The smaller tracks at the top are those of a female, with slightly more angular edges on the outer pad. Leopards are solitary creatures that only spend time with others when they are mating or raising young. Leopards, top predators of the African savannah, are known to feed on a variety of prey species. It has been largely unknown, however, whether they specialize in certain prey animals and which factors might influence prey preferences. Females need less energy owing to their lower body weight, but are also restricted in their movements when rearing young cubs, which they do on their own. The females cannot specialize on certain prey species because the abundance of these prey species would decrease over time and access to them would become more difficult in their restricted home range when rearing cubs.
A Panthera hybrid is a crossbreed between any of four species; tiger, lion, jaguar and leopard in captivity. Most hybrids would not be perpetuated in the wild as males are usually infertile. Males have lowered testosterone levels and sperm counts, making them infertile while females, though capable of reproducing with either a lion or a tiger, often give birth to sickly cubs that don’t survive. Apart from this, breeding of two different pantheras to produce hybrid big cats has been banned in many zoos and animal sanctuaries due to no conservation value of the hybrid, and the risk it poses on the mother that gives birth to it. For instance, the hybrids increased growth rate and enormous size can cause the mother giving birth to it, to have a difficult delivery, endangering both the mother and her cubs, which then may be born prematurely or require a caesarean. Common problems in cubs that survive are neurological disorders, obesity, genetic defects, and a shortened lifespan; though a few have reportedly made it to their twenties, many don’t survive past the age of seven. This image shows what a panthera hybrid looks like. An example of cross breeding is a pumapard. This is a hybrid of a puma and a leopard. Both male pumas with female leopard and male leopard with female puma pairings have produced offspring. In general, these hybrids have exhibited a tendency to dwarfism.
The species is believed to have originated in the Himalayas. The temperature there is naturally cold and this caused the Panthera Blytheae to have a very thick coat so that it could withstand these harsh temperatures. Over time leopards evolved and they also moved to areas of Africa, which is now most common for the destination of leopards. The leopard that is most tightly related to the Panthera Blytheae due to destination is the snow leopard, as it lives in the Himalayas. Some relatives of the leopards such as lions, tigers and jaguars all live in heated climates in Africa, this suggests that there was another species of Panthera before Panthera Blytheae, because that species will also be more similar to the other felines. Africa is a close region to the Himalayas which explains why leopards and some feline ‘cousins’ live there to. In the image to the right, it shows where the Himalayas are, they are on the border of China and India. The Leopard can be found inhabiting numerous different areas providing that there is a good source of cover and an ample supply of food including tropical rainforests, tree-lined savannah, barren deserts and mountain highlands. One of the reasons why they are thought to be still surviving successfully throughout much of their natural range is that Leopards have adapted to the growing presence of people and are known to both live and hunt in areas close to urban activity. However, in some parts of their natural range populations are threatened by loss of their natural habitats to both deforestation and growing settlements.
The first fossil of Panthera blytheae was in 2010 by Jack Tseng of the American Museum of Natural History, in the Zanda Basin, located in the Tibetan Plateau. Currently, only a fossil of a Panthera blytheae cranium has been found. The fossil is around the same size as a cranium bone of a leopard in this day and age. Based on the age of the fossil, Panthera blytheae is believed to have a very similar diet to the snow leopard, as many species that constitute a large part of the snow leopard's diet existed before the extinction of Panthera blytheae. Panthera blytheae is not believed to be as closely related to the other extant species of the Panthera genus and is therefore not believed to be the common ancestor of all pantherines. This implies that the divergence of the Panthera genus from the rest of Felidae was much earlier, with current estimates being approximately 16.4 million years ago. Although the oldest pantherine fossils occur in Africa, molecular phylogenies point to Asia as their region of origin. A ‘total evidence’ phylogenetic analysis of pantherines indicates that the new cat is closely related to the snow leopard and exhibits intermediate characteristics on the evolutionary line to the largest cats. The image on the right shows the cranium bone found from the Panthers Blytheae.
