Born at the end of the Oligocene, cats have evolved and spread over 25 million years, occupying almost the entire land except Antarctica, Oceania, the Far North and a few islands, becoming the top predators in nature that combine strength, speed and agility. Domestic cats, domesticated from wild small cats, became the most common pets today, following humans throughout the planet.
Wild cat distribution map, blue is the leopard subfamily gathering place, green is the cat subfamily cluster
There are 41 extant cat species, divided into two subfamily - the leopard subfamily and the cat subfamily. The leopard subfamily is divided into two genera, Leopard and Clouded Leopard, the five species of the leopard genus - Tiger, Lion, Jaguar, Leopard, snow leopard are all big cats, and two species of Clouded Leopard and Sunda Clouded Leopard (Malay Clouded Leopard) are medium-sized cats. In addition, all cats are subfamily, the cat subfamily is divided into 12 genera, most of which are small and medium-sized cats, but there are also two big guys - the cougar of the American golden cat genus and the cheetah of the genus Cheetah.
Mountain lions and cheetahs are the only large cats in the genus Leopard, and they stand out from the cat subfamily. This article will talk about the origin, characteristics, distribution and survival status of mountain lions and cheetahs, so that more people can understand these two beautiful and unique big cats.
<h1>The origin of both</h1>
The following figure is the cat evolution tree, which can clearly see the classification and evolutionary relationship of various cats.
Cheetahs, mountain lions, and slender-waisted cats are the most recent, and their ancestors entered the North American continent through the Bering Land Bridge about 6.7 million years ago, evolving the American golden cat lineage (family), and subsequently diverging into the American golden cat genus and cheetah genus. About 3 million years ago, the Panamanian land bridge (isthmus) was formed, and the genus Golden Cat of the Americas spread to South America and survived to this day, and then differentiated into the genus Slender-waisted Cat.
Slender-waisted cat
Some of the genus Cheetahs returned to Eurasia via the Bering Land Bridge and entered the African continent, during which the genus evolved many species, but they did not withstand the drastic changes in the environment and died out, and only one species remains today. The genus Cheetah that remained in North America evolved into the North American cheetah, hunting the horned antelope in the vast grasslands of the North American continent, where the chamois is still living today, but the North American cheetah was completely extinct in the Pleistocene 12,000 years ago.
Big cats
Mountain lions, cheetahs and slender-waisted cats are the only three species left in the American golden cat lineage, and slender-waisted cats have chosen a path of miniaturization, while mountain lions and cheetahs have retained their large size and become the two "giants" in the cat subfamily. Although mountain lions and cheetahs are in the same vein, their appearance is very different, and their ecological status and living conditions are also very different.
<h1>puma</h1>
Mountain lion, the largest extant cat subfamily, many people as the name suggests, think that it is a lion living in the Americas, in fact, it is very far away from the lion, because the fur is yellowish brown and no pattern, the overall shape and the lioness is very similar, so the lion to name, the most significant feature of the mountain lion is that there are black hairs on both sides of the snout, shaped like a "circle beard". Countries in the Americas use as many as 40 names for mountain lions, such as mountain lions, silver lions, red tigers, purple leopards, Elvis Presley, Indian devils, etc., but eventually "mountain lions" became their Chinese scientific names. In the West, its loudest name is Puma (Mountain Lion), and there is a famous sports brand in Germany that is named after it.
Mountain lion distribution map
The mountain lion is one of the most widely distributed cats, living in the yukon river basin of Canada in the north, to the Patagonian Plateau in the south, across the latitude of 110°, is the largest distribution range of wild cats across latitude (if the longitude is concerned, it is the largest Eurasian lynx, west to the Atlantic Ocean, east to the Pacific Ocean, across the longitude of 180 °). The mountain lion is extremely adaptable and can survive in a variety of environments, and it can be seen in the grasslands, Gobi, snow fields, forests, swamps, plateaus, and mountains of the American continent. It can adapt to temperatures of -20° to 30° and can move in areas above 4000 meters above sea level. The cougar has thick forelimbs, muscular, sprint speed, swooping ability and bounce power are very amazing, and the strong hunting ability is an effective guarantee for the survival of mountain lions in various environments.
The cougar bounces amazingly
The cougar once lived in an area that included all of Latin America and nearly half of North America, with up to 32 subspecies classified according to the traditional classification, merged into 6 effective subspecies after a geographical system study in 2000, the entire population north of Costa Rica merged into the North American mountain lion, and Latin America divided into 5.
The figure above is the distribution map of the mountain lion subspecies, from north to south: North American mountain lion, Costa Rican mountain lion, Anthony mountain lion, Brazilian mountain lion, Argentine mountain lion, Chilean mountain lion. But according to the latest genetic research, only two subspecies have been identified — the South American subspecies and the Central and North American subspecies. According to IUCN statistics, the current distribution area of mountain lions is as high as 22.74 million square kilometers, equivalent to 3 Australians, and the previous distribution area is even larger.
Cougars photographed in Florida
In 2018, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) announced that mountain lions in the east had not been found for more than 80 years, thus confirming the extinction of mountain lions in this area. The last wild mountain lion in the eastern United States was recorded to be hunted in Maine in 1938. The area east of the Mississippi River is currently home to only wild mountain lions in Florida, which also nearly became extinct in the last century, saving the population by introducing species from other regions.
Mountain lions catch mallards
In 2015, the Nature Conservancy (TNC) signed a conservation agreement with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and a Pennsylvania service company to expand the habitat of Florida mountain lions by making a 600-hectare florida ranch a mountain lion sanctuary.
A recently born puma cub
The number of mountain lions in the states west of the Mississippi River remains stable, and according to statistics, there are about 4,000-6,000 wild mountain lions in California, about 6,400 in Oregon, and thousands in the rest of the western states. By comparison, there are only about 5,000 wild tigers in the world. As a result, it is even legal to hunt mountain lions in some states, and it is also popular in the pet market.
A mountain lion that was hunted
Giant mountain lion hunted by a 60-year-old hunter in the United States
There were nearly 2,050 human and cougar encounters in California between 2001 and 2004, and 45 cougars were shot for threatening humans.
A Cougar P-22 with a radio collar mounted appeared in Los Angeles, a Hollywood landmark in the distance
Michael Robinson of the Centre for Biodiversity Conservation said: "We need large predators like mountain lions to maintain food chain stability, which can effectively control deer populations within a reasonable range and curb tick-borne diseases that endanger human health, so we recommend that mountain lions should be reintroduced in the east and central regions." ”
The Chilean cougar family of five has a round head
The cougar is a representative species in the western United States, but South America is its home base, and the complex Terrain and the inaccessible Patagonian Plateau are ideal habitats for mountain lions. The mountain lion is too widely distributed to be estimated, with about 50,000-100,000 individuals, and has been identified as unsafe by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and the only type of large cat that is not endangered.
The figure above is a table of mountain lion weight data by region, with the largest population type in Canada, with an average male of 71 kg and a female average of 44 kg; followed by Chile, with an average of 68.8 kg for males and 45.1 kg for females; and a population of males between 53.6 and 62.4 kg for females in the United States and between 30.7 and 44.5 kg for females.
The largest individual recognized by the American Institute of Biology, a wild mountain lion, was hunted in Arizona in 1917 and weighed 125 kilograms, which is said to be the weight after the internal organs were removed. Hunting records in Utah and Nevada from 1946 to 1958 included 92.5 kg and 120.2 kg of individuals.
So in terms of maximum weight alone, mountain lions rank fourth in the cat family (jaguars up to 143 kg and leopards up to 115 kg).
The cougar hunts the camel, and the muscles of the whole body are perfectly displayed
Mountain lions are not small, and they have extremely strong fighting ability, so they have few opponents in nature. According to the data, 47.5% of the cougar's living area overlaps with brown bears, american black bears, jaguars and gray wolves, mainly in Canada, the northwest of the continental United States and the Amazon region, and mountain lions are often at a disadvantage in conflicts with them, but they do not affect the population of mountain lions. In the remaining 52.5% of the living area, the mountain lion has no opponent, and the biggest threat to the mountain lion is still human.
<h1>cheetah</h1>
There are two species in the feline family that evolve in very extreme directions, one is the snow leopard and the other is the cheetah.
Cheetahs are well known, and we recognize this "sprinter" from various places at a very young age. The cheetah is the fastest running animal in nature, it can reach 70mph, that is, 112.65 km / h, can accelerate to 65 km / h in 2 seconds, but it can only run at a high speed of 200-300 meters, if it fails to catch the prey within this distance, it can only give up. The second fastest running cat is the mountain lion mentioned above, which can reach 70 km/h.
Cheetah distribution map, light color is historical distribution, dark color existing distribution
Cheetahs are also known as Indian leopards because they are most easily seen in South Asia by modern British biologists. Cheetahs, like lions, have historically been widely distributed in Africa and southwest Asia, and have been domesticated by ancient civilizations and nomadic peoples in North Africa, West Asia, and Central Asia to assist in hunting, hence the name "cheetah". The history of human domestication of cheetahs dates back to the Sumerians of the Two Rivers Valley in 3000 BC, and cheetahs were status symbols in ancient Egypt and ancient India.
The image of a cheetah in the murals of the Eighteenth Dynasty of Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egyptian frescoes are reconstructed, and a cheetah is followed next to the carriage
China's ancients came into contact with cheetahs two thousand years ago, and cheetahs paid tribute to the Central Plains Dynasty through the Silk Road around the Time of the Han Dynasty, and lions also entered China during this period. During the Tang Dynasty, cheetah culture flourished in high-level society, and many pottery figurines in the shape of horse-ridden cheetahs were unearthed from the tombs of the Tang Dynasty clans. In the paintings, this shape is called "Ma Negative Wen Leopard" (Wen Leopard is actually the elegant name of the Golden Leopard, but the ancients could not distinguish between the Golden Leopard and the Cheetah, so the Cheetah was also called the Composition Leopard). Wild cheetahs are captured by hunters, and professional leopard trainers undergo cruel training to squat safely on horseback and follow the knights to the major hunting grounds to provide assistance for noble hunting, called "leopard hunting".
Tang Dynasty Zhanghuai Prince's tomb in the "Hunting Travel Map" "Ma Negative Wen Leopard" part
The ancient Chinese painting and calligraphy work "Ma Negative Wen Leopard" first appeared in the Northern Dynasty period, Zhan Ziqian's famous work "Qi Hou Lord Xing Jinyang Palace Map" describes the scene of the Northern Qi nobles hunting in the Jinyang Palace in Taiyuan, and hao Jing in the early Yuan Dynasty has the sentence "Mahou cheetah golden bell, the front sea blue side wing looking" in the poem titled by Hao Jing for the painting. The murals of leopard taming unearthed from the tomb of Prince Yide of the Tang Dynasty are very vivid, and the image of the cheetah crouching on horseback in the "Hunting Travel Map" in the tomb of Prince Zhanghuai of the Tang Dynasty is clearly visible.
On the left is the "Hunting Map of the Ancestors of the Yuan Dynasty", and on the right is the partial map of "Ma Negative Wen Leopard"
During the Liao and Yuan dynasties, leopard hunting activities were very popular among the nobility, and the sources of cheetahs were more extensive, and cheetahs from Central Asia, Persia and India were able to enter the Central Plains through trade routes. The leopard trainer in Liu Guandao's "Hunting Map of the Ancestors of the Yuan Dynasty" is a Hu costume, and the poem "Flying Leopard Line" by Wang Yun of the Yuan Dynasty records the scene of Kublai Khan's leopard hunting, and Marco Polo also describes Kublai Khan's use of cheetah hunting. In the early Ming Dynasty, cheetahs entered China more frequently, and the Timur Empire repeatedly offered cheetahs to the Ming court. In the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the Western Trade Route gradually declined, and the number of cheetahs entering China began to decrease.
Throughout the ancient history of the cheetah in China, it has always been a rare and exotic beast that can only be accessed by the upper class, so the cheetah culture has not been popular in China like the lion culture.
Humans have domesticated cheetahs for 5,000 years, but they have not been able to domesticate them, which has caused great harm to the cheetah population. In 1472 the traveler Joseph Barbaro described seeing 100 cheetahs raised by a prince at the Armenian court; it is recorded that during the reign of Akbar the Great of the Mughal Empire in India, his royal hunting grounds domesticated 1,000 cheetahs at most. The continuous development of musket technology in modern times has also brought disaster to the Asian cheetah, and it cannot escape the siege of the shotgun no matter how fast it can run.
Cheetahs in Azerbaijan and the Caucasus were essentially extinct in the mid-18th century;
Cheetahs from turkey's Anatolian highlands were extinct in the 19th century;
The last definitive cheetah sightings recorded in Iraq were recorded in November 1926;
Four cheetahs were shot in northern Saudi Arabia in 1950-1959 and two in the north-western province of Hail in 1973;
In March 1963, yemen's last cheetah individual was observed by J.T. Ducker on the Mitan River in South Yemen;
In 1977, Oman's last cheetah was shot by tribal hunters in Dhofar province;
In 1948, the last 3 wild cheetahs in India were hunted in Madhya Pradesh, and in 1995 the last cheetah at delhi zoo died, declaring the species completely extinct in India. The Asiatic lion has suffered the same as the Asian cheetah in modern times, but India saved the Asiatic lion, but failed to save the Asian cheetah.
Surprisingly, the Asian cheetah was rediscovered in the mountains of northern Iran at the end of the last century, the only remaining wild population of Asian cheetahs. Iran established the Iranian Cheetah Conservation Association (ICS) in 2001 to start a conservation program for Asian cheetahs, but so far, there are fewer than 50 Asian cheetahs in the wild. The Asiatic cheetah's protected area covers 60,000 square kilometres, with conservation personnel patrolling day and night and herding rabbits and antelopes feeding the cheetahs, but only 20 sightings were reported in 2016 and about 20 Asian cheetahs were killed on the road in 2001-2016.
There are only a few cheetahs in The Iranian breeding center, the most famous being the male leopard Kushki, the female leopard Delbar and Iran. Earlier this year, artificial breeding plans for Delbar failed.
Male leopard Kushki
Female leopard Delbar
The current situation of African cheetahs is not optimistic.
A 2016 report published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences said that there are only more than 7,100 wild cheetahs in the world, down 93% from 1990, and the number of cheetahs will decline by 53% in the next 15 years.
Six countries in southern Africa have the highest concentration of cheetahs, with about 6,800 in the wild, while those in Zimbabwe have fallen from 1,200 to 170 in 16 years. About 77 percent of cheetahs live outside protected areas and national parks, and they can be hunted at any time.
In the pet market, cheetahs are still hot, with reports that more than 1,200 cheetahs have been sold outside of Africa in 10 years, with 85 percent of them dying on the way. There is no killing without buying and selling, and the "love" of cheetahs for thousands of years is forcing this species to the end!
Cheetahs have traditionally been divided into 5 subspecies, and after revision there are 3 – nominate subspecies, West African subspecies, and Indian subspecies (Asian cheetah). Cheetahs gave up their weight in order to gain extreme speed and lost their fighting ability. Cheetah males in East Africa weigh an average of 44 kg and females an average of 37.5 kg; in southern Africa cheetahs an average of 46.6 kg and females an average of 39 kg; and in Asian cheetah males an average of 30.5 kg.
Spotted hyenas rob cheetahs of food
Lioness drives cheetahs
Cheetahs lack fighting ability, making it difficult to compete with other predators, and in Africa, spotted hyenas, leopards and lions often rob cheetahs of food, and leopards kill cheetahs. In Asia, Bafg of Iran's Yazd governorate recently reported an incident of Persian leopards killing Asian cheetahs.
Mountain lions and cheetahs are the only big cats in the cat subfamily, and they have evolved over millions of years to emerge from the cat subfamily as nature's top predators, and today they are in great need of human protection.
Big cats are nature's top predators, they are vital to the ecological environment, and protecting them is a common task for all of humanity.