The jaguar is the third largest living cat, second only to the lion and the tiger. It stands to reason that such a large cat cannot be compared to the small and medium-sized cat clouded leopard, but in fact the adult jaguar is Cats with very different sizes. Their smallest adult only weighs 36 kilograms, so the largest clouded leopard can compete with the smallest jaguar in terms of size.
So, can the largest clouded leopard defeat the smallest jaguar? We might as well first take a brief look at the strengths of the two animals.
Jaguars widely inhabit forests and tropical rainforests in Central and South America, especially in a wide range of habitats. The density of prey in different environments varies greatly, which leads to differences in individual jaguars. The body size difference between them is very large.
On the whole, the size of jaguars becomes larger as they go south, and vice versa. For example, the average weight of jaguars in the forests of the Pacific Coast of Mexico is only 50 kilograms, which is about the same size as a leopard. But it's different when you go south to the Brazilian rainforest. The average weight of male jaguars here reaches about 95 kilograms, and the average weight of females is 68 kilograms. The largest individual reaches 158 kilograms, which is already the same as that of an adult male liger. The weight is almost the same, and the lower limit of the female jaguar here is 56 kilograms.
However, the jaguars in the northern forest are different. In addition to their average weight of only 50 kilograms (the weight of males and females is average), the minimum weight of adult females is only 36 kilograms.
The clouded leopard is the collective name for two species of animals in the genus Clouded Leopard of the cat family. From a genetic point of view, the genus Clouded Leopard is closer to the genus Leopard than the genus Cat. However, if its size is compared with that of the genus Leopard, It will be stretched.
The clouded leopard was originally thought to be one kind of animal, and clouded leopards living in different regions were only subspecies. However, in recent years, as scientists conducted genetic analysis of clouded leopards in different regions, they found that The Sunda clouded leopard and the clouded leopard, which were originally considered to be one of the subspecies of the clouded leopard, have evolved separately for more than 1 million years, so they are listed as separate species. So far, the clouded leopard has two and three subspecies, among which the Sunda There are no subspecies of clouded leopards, and there are no genetic differences between those on Sumatra and Borneo. There are three subspecies of clouded leopards: the named subspecies, the Taiwanese subspecies, and the Himalayan subspecies.
Among cats, clouded leopards can be said to be the most mysterious, because they usually live in inaccessible tropical and subtropical forests, and they are wary by nature, with strong hearing and smelling abilities, so people It is difficult to search for them, which has led to the fact that the scientific community currently knows very little about the habits of clouded leopards. It is only known that they are nocturnal and may live a solitary life, and they are the cats that like to stay in trees. animal.
The clouded leopard’s main prey comes from trees, including civets, macaques, gibbons, birds, etc. They have the longest canine teeth of cats in the same proportion. It can be up to 7 centimeters long. You must know that even the largest existing cats, tigers and lions, have canine teeth of only 3-5 centimeters. Therefore, if it is enlarged, it should be the cat closest to the saber-toothed tiger.
In terms of body size, adults The average body length of the clouded leopard is about 90 centimeters (excluding the tail), and the average weight is about 32 kilograms. The largest known clouded leopard weighs 38 kilograms.