Conservation and management of snow leopards (Uncia uncia) has largely relied on anecdotal evidence and presence–absence data due to their cryptic nature and the difficult terrain they inhabit. These methods generally lack the scientific rigor necessary to accurately estimate population size and monitor trends. We evaluated the use of photography in capture–mark–recapture (CMR) techniques for e...

numbers of persian leopards have considerably decreased in recent years and for this reason it has been categorized as endangered in the iucn classification. habitat destruction is believed to be the main cause of the species population decline. hence, attempts to preserve the remaining habitats of this kind of animal effectively are deemed essential in reversing its downgrading trend. to hit t...

Predation strategies in response to altering prey abundances can dramatically influence the demographic effects of predation. Despite this, predation strategies of humans are rarely incorporated into quantitative assessments of the demographic impacts of humans killing carnivores. This scarcity largely seems to be caused by a lack of data. In this study, we contrasted predation strategies exhib...

The effects of sudden cooling of the spinal cord were studied in three species of amphibians--a cold-sensitive tropical toad (Bufo marinus), a cold-resistant, aquatic, hibernating frog (Rana pipiens, northern leopard frog) and a freeze-tolerant frog (Rana sylvatica, wood frog). Ventral root (motoneuron) potentials were recorded from isolated, hemisected spinal cords of each species mounted in a...

Natal dispersal enables population connectivity, gene flow and metapopulation dynamics. In polygynous mammals, dispersal is typically male-biased. Classically, the 'mate competition', 'resource competition' and 'resident fitness' hypotheses predict density-dependent dispersal patterns, while the 'inbreeding avoidance' hypothesis posits density-independent dispersal. In a leopard (Panthera pardu...

We measured concentrations of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins (PCDDs), and polychlorinated dibenzofurans (PCDFs) in northern leopard frogs collected from the Green Bay ecosystem and explored the catalytic activity of hepatic cytochrome P450-associated monooxygenase (P450 enzyme) as a biomarker for exposure to aryl hydrocarbon receptor (AhR) agonists. The two ...

Abstract Two of the Antarctic pack ice seals, Ross, Ommatophoca rossii , and leopard, Hydrurga leptonyx, are extremely difficult to study via traditional visual survey techniques, yet ideal for an acoustic as they highly vociferous produce array underwater sounds during austral summer. To determine their occurrence in ice, we use calls, detected within 680 recordings made between 1999 2009 part...

Livestock is represented in big cat diets throughout the world. Husbandry approaches aim to reduce depredation, which may influence patterns of prey choice, but whether felids have a preference for livestock or not often remains unclear as most studies ignore livestock availability. We assessed prey choice of the endangered Persian leopard (Panthera pardus saxicolor) in Golestan National Park, ...

Incubation temperature during embryonic development determines gonadal sex in the leopard gecko (Eublepharis macularius). Incubation temperature and gonadal sex jointly influence the display of sexual and agonistic behavior in adult leopard geckos. These differences in adult behavior are organized prior to sexual maturity, and it is plausible that post-natal hormones influence neural and behavi...