Northern India’s elusive snow leopards get their close up

Adapted to unrecorded successful immoderate of our planet’s most inhospitable mountainous regions, snow leopards (Panthera uncia) are the eventual upland climbers and an iconic large cat. A caller camera trapping survey recovered that India is location to the astir dense colonisation of the achromatic and achromatic carnivores connected Earth and astir unrecorded successful a distant bluish portion of the subcontinent. Here, they besides look to co-exist alongside agrarian communities, wherever they are respected by section quality populations. The findings are elaborate successful a study published May 7 successful the open-access diary PLOS One.

Snow leopards are recovered successful mountainous regions crossed 12 Asian countries: Afghanistan, Bhutan, China, India, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyz Republic, Mongolia, Nepal, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. Their signature fur acts arsenic earthy camouflage against the snowy mountains, wherever they prey on a assortment of sheep, ibex, hares, marmots, and pika.

In bid to efficaciously conserve this vulnerable species, researchers request coagulated information connected their colonisation size and wherever they are living. However, the distant and rugged terrain that they telephone location and their notoriously shy quality makes this difficult.

In this new study, a squad from the Department of Wildlife Protection successful northern India’s Ladakh Union Territory assessed the snowfall leopard colonisation crossed astir 23,000 quadrate miles of landscape. The squad started by looking for the tell-tale signs of snowfall leopards–footprints, scat, and scratch marks. They besides surveyed for ample carnivores similar brownish bears and lynx and chaotic herbivores and livestock.

Next, they acceptable up 956 camera traps on astir 3,300 quadrate miles occupied by the snowfall leopards. These non-invasive cameras are utilized to assistance scientists estimation carnal populations crossed territories.

“To photograph snowfall leopards’ foreheads, we had to marque them airs successful beforehand of our cameras,” the squad wrote successful a statement. “This was done by spraying a tiny magnitude of perfume conscionable beneath the cameras that were deployed adjacent their favored scent marking rocks connected the precocious ridge tops. The funny leopards little their heads to odor the caller odor and we person our prized photos!”

Finally, they utilized artificial intelligence to analyse the photos and place idiosyncratic snowfall leopards by their chiseled patterns of markings connected their foreheads. This method called “fingerprinting” uses a peculiar signifier designation bundle to look astatine the spot patterns and store them successful a database. This way, scientists tin comparison it with different snowfall leopard photos and travel up with matches.

“This reduced our enactment galore fold and improved the accuracy of close idiosyncratic recognition that is important for colonisation estimation utilizing statistical models,” the squad says.

With this data, the squad estimates that Ladakh is location to 477 snowfall leopards, oregon 68 percent of India’s full population. The density varied betwixt 1 to 3 snowfall leopards per 38 quadrate miles. According to these results, Hemis National Park has the highest density of snowfall leopards recorded anyplace connected Earth.

Additionally, 61 percent of snowfall leopards successful Ladakh co-exist close alongside quality populations. The resource-rich grasslands with a mean clime and analyzable terrain tended to person a higher fig of snowfall leopards, apt owed to much prey and little quality disturbance.

[ Related: Mountain lions successful Los Angeles go nighttime owls to debar humans. ]

According to the team, this method of tracking and monitoring snowfall leopards could beryllium utilized to regularly show these elusive large cats astir the globe. They besides generated a nationalist photograph room of snowfall leopards, which tin assistance conservationists who show carnal poaching and trafficking.

The squad believes that aggregate factors play into this wide organisation and precocious colonisation density of snowfall leopards successful Ladakh. Here, the animals person abundant prey, rugged and distant landscapes to unrecorded on, debased quality colonisation density, and a civilization of deep respect for wildlife among section communities.

“The deep-rooted reverence for wildlife among Ladakh’s communities, combined with the economical benefits from snowfall leopard tourism and struggle absorption strategies, helps prolong immoderate of the world’s highest snowfall leopard densities—a exemplary that could beryllium adapted and upscaled crossed the species’ range,” the squad concludes.