African Leopards

[BorneanTiger]

(06-02-2019, 05:00 PM)Lycaon Wrote: The Cape Leopard Trust

What better way to start a new week than with an epic leopard photo like this!! Our Cederberg team recently downloaded their latest batch of images from the camera traps, and among them was this absolute gem, taken in the height of winter near Bakleikraal in the Cederberg. 
This stunning adult male is known as CM41, or Gorib, which means ‘the spotted one’ in Central Khoisan languages. His name is particularly apt in this instance, with his dark rosettes in stark contrast to the white snowy surroundings. 
Downloading photos from the camera traps is always a treat, but images like these just make us jump for joy!

*This image is copyright of its original author

Speaking of leopards in temperate regions, according to Sir Alfred Edward Pease, a British hunter in Africa who wrote the "Book of the lion" (https://archive.org/stream/bookoflion191...4/mode/2up), in the Atlas region of North Africa, the black panther, as in a melanistic version of the Barbary leopard, was a more ferocious and feared man-eater than the Barbary lion, besides being almost as large as it!

*This image is copyright of its original author

*This image is copyright of its original author

Sir Pease (https://archive.org/stream/bookoflion191...4/mode/2up) read in a French newspaper that an Algerian leopard killed in 1913 measured 8 feet 10 inches (269 cm), and that this was before being skinned. The record set by the Algerian panther is greater than that of an Indian leopard from Bilaspur, which had a weight of 71 kg (157 lbs), height of 34 inches (86 cm) at the shoulder, and length of 8 feet 7 inches (262 cm) from head to tail: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city...227308.cms, http://www.tribuneindia.com/news/himacha...42548.html

*This image is copyright of its original author

In Page 100 (https://archive.org/stream/bookoflion191...0/mode/2up), Pease quoted measurements for a Barbary lion from Algeria: 

*This image is copyright of its original author

Assuming that this Algerian panther was about as large as an Algerian lion (https://archive.org/stream/bookoflion191...4/mode/2up), what we are looking at is a dark, large, powerful and terrifying leopard that was possibly about 95 cm or 1⅜ inches at the shoulder, 8 feet 10 inches (269 cm) from head to tail (longer than how a normal male lion would be between the pegs, as in the length of the body without that of the tail). No wonder people in North Africa would fear a panther like that (https://archive.org/stream/bookoflion191...6/mode/2up)! Reply