leopard Design to Kill

➽    Designed To Kill   ➽

 

 

The Leopard's principal weapons of attack are its claws, five on fore feet and four on hind feet. When the Leopard extends its paw to strike, the claws emerge instantly. 

Even the Leopard's strikingly beautiful coat, aids in its killing and surviving. This spotted hide is such a perfect camouflage that in broken lights and shadows, they deceive the eye and obscure body contours.  
Yet, with all these marvelous physical endowments the Leopard's most important single asset is its intelligence, which ranks high on the evolutionary tree. 

The Leopard's long tail provides a balance when it climbs. It spends much time resting or hiding in large crowned trees like banyan, tamarind, and teak. Being versatile predators, Leopards hunt mainly at night , but may also hunt during daytime. Once they detect the game by sight, they creep up silently before springing on their prey.

Usually after the kill, the Leopard drags the carcass into a dense thicket, where it can feed undisturbed. Before feeding, it disembowels the carcass and discards the guts. It usually prefers to eat the heart and the liver first, then the haunches. The uneaten portion of the carcass is occasionally hauled up into a tree or thick bushes, where it is safe from other animals.

 

➽    Most Adaptable Animal   ➽

Most stealthier and athletic than the other big cats, the Leopard can run, jump, swim and climb trees with wonderful ease. The Leopards are spread over much of Gujarat, and in Gir they have been found in all the varied habitats and vegetation types i.e. deciduous,

Teak dominant forests, thorn scrub, grasslands, riverine forests and village cultivated fields. Similarly it can occupy any terrain, whether it be hilly, undulating or flat. 

➽    Dedicated And Devoted   ➽

A Leopard takes only one mate as has been generally seen, and the pair show strong affection for each other. The home for the cubs is likely to be a cave, a place under a rock ledge or a hollow tree. From the time they are weaned at four months, until their death 16 to 23 years later, Leopards start training the offspring in the art of hunting and survival, as soon as they can waddle.

The mother teaches the cubs to stalk her moving tail and quickly moves it out of the way at the last moment. She will keep up with this wonderful practice till the cubs finally manage to catch it. The mother also takes them stalking in the forest or rocky areas to give them a glimpse of the real world. Education out there is for real. The cub that fails, starves, gets injured or simply dies.

 

 More

The latest census of leopards in Gujarat has shown a healthy 20.25% increase in their population in the last five years. In fact, with 1,395 leopards, the state has the second highest population of these wild cats in India after Madhya Pradesh (1,817).
The number of leopards has increased to 1,395 in 2015 from 1,160 in 2011, according to data made public by the state government at the two-day national workshop on Asiatic lions' conservation at SasanGir

However, the worrisome revelation was that nearly 34% or about 470 leopards were found in the revenue areas close to human habitat. Incidents of leopards mauling people, mostly farm labourers sleeping in the open, have been reported frequently in Saurashtra in the past 2-3 years.  

Gujarat is the only state in the country which has been conducting leopard count every five years. The latest data shows that Navsari district witnessed the highest increase in leopard population as the numbers grew from 32 in 2011 to 48 in the last five years.
Five districts -Valsad, Bharuch, Sabarkantha, Mehsana and Tapi -witnessed a fall in the leopard population. Experts say it was possible as leopards might have migrated to nearby districts.

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