23 fun facts about leopards

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1. Leopards can carry prey twice their body weight up into trees.

Leopards usually hunt medium-sized ungulates weighing 10-40kg but on occasion, they do hunt larger prey such as young giraffes or even on rare occasions, adult male elands who weigh nearly 1,000kg!

2. A black panther isn’t a separate species.

It’s the name for a leopard or jaguar with melanism, a genetic mutation that causes dark coloration. This genetic mutation in leopards appears to be strongly affected by ‘natural selection’, with factors such as efficacy of camouflage or thermoregulation (ability to regulate your temperature) influencing where ‘black panthers’ live.

3. Leopards are the most widely distributed large felid and can be found in 63 countries.

Leopards can be found from the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa, throughout Africa, the Middle East and southeast Asia, and even in the Amur Peninsula in Far East Russia. Despite their wide range across Africa and Asia, leopard populations are increasingly fragmented, and many populations are isolated and restricted to protected areas.

4. A leopard in South Africa was filmed free-falling from a tree, from a height of nine metres, to catch prey on the ground.

Some leopards develop unique hunting methods and this daredevil method of free-falling is very dangerous, but can be successful.

5. Leopards are highly adaptable.

Unlike lions, they live in extremely variable habitats ranging from desert to rainforest, and even urban environments. They also have very adaptable hunting and feeding behaviour, and this allows them to adapt to different environments, as long as there is enough cover and prey-animals.

6. Leopards are solitary cats and are mainly nocturnal.

They are usually most active between sunset and sunrise.

7. A leopard’s spots are actually called ‘rosettes’.

Leopards and jaguars have similarly spotted fur, but jaguars often have a small spot within their rosette while leopards don’t.

8. A female leopard typically gives birth to two-four cubs but, on rare instances, up to six cubs can be born.

Cubs are blind for around the first week, as their eyes have not yet opened. Cubs will stay with their mother for 12-18 months until they are ready for independence and have learned enough from their mothers to survive and hunt on their own.

9. When hunting, the tip of a leopard’s tail may twitch.

This trait is also seen in domestic cats and may not seem helpful to remain hidden when hunting, but in fact, it may help. The tip of the tail is thought to distract the prey, helping a leopard to hunt successfully. More research is needed to discover more about this behaviour.

10. Leopards have been known to live on the edge of big cities like Mumbai, India and Nairobi, Kenya.

Some leopard populations have adapted to urban environments and around areas such as Mumbai are even able to thrive, despite living so close to humans. The density of leopards in the Sanjay Gandhi National Park, which is surrounded by Mumbai, is one of the highest ever recorded.

11. Leopards are carnivores and have been known to eat more than 90 different species of prey.

It is this flexibility that helps them to adapt to different environments. In the forests of the Cote D’Ivoire, West Africa, leopards have been recorded hunting eight different monkey species and chimpanzees.

12. Leopards have a range of vocalisations.

One of their most distinctive vocalisations is a rasping cough-like call, similar to sawing wood. On some occasions, they have even been heard to duet, where one leopard will call, and another will reply.

13. Leopards have been found living at altitudes of 5,200 metres in the Himalayas.

In some areas of China and Nepal, snow leopards and leopards have been recorded in the same locations.

14. Snow leopards and leopards are from the same genus (Panthera) but are different species.

A clouded leopard, although it shares the leopard’s name, is from a different genus (Neofelis).

15. Leopards originated in Africa.

Fossil records suggest the modern leopard (Panthera pardus), originated 470,000–850,000 years ago. They then migrated to Asia between 170,000–300,300 years ago.

16. Leopards have five toes on their front paws but only four toes on the back!

The extra toe on their front paws is used only when hunting to help bring down prey.

17. A leopard’s home range size can be as large as 174 square miles (451km²)!

Male leopard home ranges are usually bigger than a female leopard with the environment hugely influencing home range size. Leopards living in semi-arid and arid environments, where there is low prey availability, have the biggest home ranges, such as populations living in Namibia.

18. Juvenile male leopards must find their own home range.

Females, however, will often take over an area of their mother’s home range.

19. Lions, tigers and hyenas will sometimes steal food from leopards after they have made a kill.

This is called ‘kleptoparasitism’, a feeding strategy where one animal deliberately steals food from another. When leopards are sharing an area with larger predators, they will tend to choose smaller prey and hide their kills in trees, bushes and even in caves on some occasions.

20. There are nine subspecies of leopard.

According to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature these are the: African Leopard (Panthera pardus pardus); Amur Leopard (Panthera pardus orientalis); Arabian Leopard (Panthera pardus nimr); Indian Leopard (Panthera pardus fusca); Indochinese Leopard (Panthera pardus delacouri); Javan Leopard (Panthera pardus melas); North China Leopard (Panthera pardus japonensis); Sri Lankan Leopard (Panthera pardus kotiya) and Persian Leopard (Panthera pardus tulliana).

21. Leopards can sometimes feed on their kill for a few days.

They will come back to feed on their prey, and this is another reason, why they often hide their food in bushes or trees – to prevent other carnivores from stealing it.

22. How a leopard kills its prey will depend on the type of animal they are hunting.

For small prey, the ‘kill bite’ will be delivered by biting the prey’s neck or puncturing their skull with their canines. For larger prey, especially those with horns or antlers, leopards will bite the throat. This helps to protects them from any injuries from the antlers.

23. Leopards mark their territory by scent-marking, roaring and tree-scratching.

This helps other leopards to know that an area is already occupied or, can alert a male leopard to a female leopard’s presence if she is ready to mate.