Livestock kills by snow leopards are a part of everyday life for many herder communities in Asia’s mountains. The financial impact on these families can be devastating, and retaliation against the cat is commonplace. But the Snow Leopard Trust’s innovative, community-run livestock insurance program is breaking this vicious cycle.
A mother and her three almost fully grown cubs visit a research camera.
Conservationists and rangers counted wild mountain ungulates in Sarychat-Ertash Nature Reserve and the adjacent Koiluu Hunting Concession, both in the Tian Shan Mountains of Kyrgyzstan. They found exceptionally high numbers of ibex and argali in the reserve, while populations in the concession were significantly lower.
How a community in Pakistan went from capturing snow leopards to protecting them.
Scientists and rangers in Mongolia conduct a comprehensive survey of ibex and argali, the snow leopard’s preferred prey species, in the Tost and Noyon mountains. The populations currently look stable and sufficiently large to sustain the area’s snow leopards.
Dagina, an eight-year old female snow leopard we’ve known since she was a tiny cub, becomes our latest cat to be tracked with a GPS collar in the world’s most comprehensive study of wild snow leopards.
Data from camera traps and GPS collars show endangered snow leopards dispersing to distant mountain ranges across stretches of deserted steppe, swimming across streams and rivers considered impossible to cross, and freely passing country borders.
A curious snow leopard decides to inspect a camera trap set up by researchers to monitor and study these endangered cats.
The snow leopard is under threat of extinction. But a local grassroots organization in Mongolia is showing a possible path toward the future for this endangered cat.
Örjan Johansson’s groundbreaking work on the snow leopard’s biology and behavior has led to novel insights into the spatial needs, predation patterns, and reproduction cycle of this elusive cat. Now, after 8 years of field work, collaring 23 individual snow leopards and spending more than 1,000 nights in the Gobi Desert, this pioneering scientist has received his PhD from the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences.
