Snow Leopard (Panthera uncia)

[Twico5]

Probably one of the most impressive predation feats we have seen in big cats: a 52kg male snow leopard that killed a ten year old adult male domestic bactrian camel. 

“Recently, a herder found one of her camels dead and suspected that a snow leopard, known to us as M15, had killed it. M15 was sitting near the top of a rock near the dead camel. The herder is part of my livestock insurance community and she called me. That evening I went to that place and set up a trap camera at 6:00 pm. I knew M15 was still around.  The camera photographed him on the kill over the next few days.”  (M15 is the largest snow leopard we have ever collared, weighing 52 kg.)“It appeared that the snow leopard had killed the camel. The camel was very big, a ten-year-old male weighing more than 400 kg. I talked to the herder, who is part of the community-managed livestock insurance program we run. She expressed how upset she was that the camel was dead. She said, “Maybe I will kill this snow leopard! If I knew this would have happened, I would have sold the camel.” She said that the camel was worth 2 million tugrik.” (about $620 USD)

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Source: https://snowleopard.org/the-reality-of-living-with-snow-leopards/ Reply