Rainforest Leopards

[Pckts]

(12-17-2020, 01:46 PM)Styx38 Wrote:

(12-17-2020, 07:40 AM)Pckts Wrote:

(12-17-2020, 03:58 AM)Styx38 Wrote:

(12-17-2020, 02:39 AM)Pckts Wrote:

(12-17-2020, 02:18 AM)Styx38 Wrote: @Pckts Rainforest Leopards are pretty robust.

They may not be the biggest but they might be the strongest Leopards P4P, considering they kill Gorillas and Red River Hogs.

Anyway, here is a juvenile Leopard from Garamba National Park.

*This image is copyright of its original author

https://it-it.facebook.com/AfricanParks/...210163181/

 Red River Hogs are in the same vein as Warthogs and Boars so I'm not sure how predation on them separates these cats from their cousins. 
Killing Gorilla's is something else entirely, how often if at all has it actually been observed, especially in modern times. Finding remains in scat doesn't paint a picture of how the animal actually died.

Considering Red River Hog was favored, and more prevalent than Suids in other Leopard diet studies, indicates that the Rainforest Leopards are stronger than the other subspecies due to taking down a relatively robust and dangerous prey at a high frequency.

Wasn't there one incidence of a Leopard and Gorilla both dying from mutually inflicted wounds? If so, this means a Leopard is strong and fierce enough to hold its own against a powerful primate.

Overall, the Rainforest Leopards are robust due to having to take down dangerous animals compared to other Leopards.

Red River Hog aren't favored more than Dulkier 

*This image is copyright of its original author

and the fact is that there are far less small to mid sized ungulates in the Congo Basin so a Leopards options are limited. In comparison the Savanah Leopard not only can prey on suids and dulkier but many more ungulates as large or larger. But regardless, anywhere they coexist, Leopards prey on suids.
Not only that but if you're judging toughness via prey preference from limited scat samples we can say the indochinese Leopard would top the list.

*This image is copyright of its original author

This is why that reasoning doesn't hold much weight but regardless, Rainforest Leopard take no larger or more dangerous prey than other Leopard species.

In regards to the  Leopard and Gorilla dying simultaneously in battle, I can't help but be very skeptical of such a claim.

Actually if you compare Leopards killing Suids or Suids in their diet from highest frequency to lowest;

It goes like this:

Lope Leopards it is Red River Hog: 19.3% (Henschel et. al., 2005)

Phinda Game Reserve Leopards it is Warthog: 12% (Balme et. al., 2007)

Waterberg (South Africa) Leopards it is Warthog: 10.26% (Swanepoel, 2008)

Waterberg Plateau (Namibia) Leopards it is Warthog : 7% (Stein, 2008)

Sariska Tiger Reserve Leopards it is Wild Boar: 2.7% ( Mondal et. al., 2012)

The Gorillas found in Henschel's study were all adults.

This would indicate that there might be a sexual dimorphism, where females focused on small Duiker while mature males took on Red River Hog and Gorilla.

If a Leopard is capable on taking dangerous and/or robust animals like Suids and large primates, this may indicate that the Leopard is stronger, or proportionally more robust. Not necessarily larger in weight.

These are based off of Biomass from scat samples.
Assuming the Dulkier was preyed more by females than River Hogs is possible but not proven although the same thing can be said about Indochinese Leopards except with Bantend instead of Muntjac with Wild Pig showing up 31% of the time, again this would mean by your logic that Indochinese Leopards should be even more robust and aggressive since they prey on Banteng and Wild Pig even more often.

"When diets were analysed separately by sex, the results showed that male and female leopard had similar diets across five broad prey categories (table 1; figure 3). Male and female diets were comprised mainly of ungulates (84.7 and 87.4% BC, respectively), whereas consumption of the other prey categories was less than 7% each (table 1; figure 3). However, when ungulate species were analysed separately, male and female leopard had opposite trends in consumption with regard to ungulate body size (figure 4). Male leopard consumed mainly banteng (61.5% BC) which was nearly 10 times the amount of muntjac consumed (6.5% BC; figure 4). In contrast, female leopard consumed mainly muntjac (55.7% BC) and had only a trace amount of banteng in its diet (less than 1% BC; figure 4). Male and female leopard consumed wild pig in moderate amounts (16.6% and 31.3%, respectively; figure 4). When compared with availability, consumption of all three ungulate species by male leopard was approximately in proportion to their biomass available (figure 4). By contrast, female leopard exhibited a strong positive selection for muntjac (D = 0.97) and a strong negative selection for banteng (D = −0.99; figure 4)."

In regards to the studies posted, there are multiple issues.

First is the limited number of studies and locations used.
For instance in India the only study used is Sariska which obviously leaves many parks undocumented and as with any park it will depend on the prey biomass that resides there.
The same for the African Studies as all are from S. Africa which of course leaves E. Africa undocumented 

Also the protocol used
Henschel for instance based it off Scat Samples while Balme based it off of actual kills and carcasses observed


Then prey taken:

For Swanepoel, 2008 the most important prey items were Kudu, Bushbuck and Warthog with Kudu making up the largest biomass of 22.68% and of course Kudu being larger than either Warthog or Red River hog.
Not to mention the mean weight of kills is higher for this study as well, @ 37.66kg but really it would be 62.55kg using only the Kill site data although using that data could overestimate it more.

Of the actual kill sites you have 58 animals
21 of them are warthogs 
Kudu with 22
Impala with 15

Even with the abundance of Warthog kills they are actually the least prevalent between the 3 species. 
1144 Impala
551 Kudua
352 Warthog 

So that would actually signify that Warthog may be easier to kill than the other 2.

I didn't go through Stein and Mondal yet but you get the picture.
There are many ways to interpret this data and many protocols used, lumping them all in one category isn't a true comparison. Reply