The Snow leopard (Panthera uncia) is no longer classified as “Endangered” by the IUCN

The snow leopard (Panthera uncia) is a large feline that inhabits the mountain ranges of Central and South Asia, and lives in the alpine and subalpine zones high up in the mountains. It is mostly found at 3,000+ meters, but can be found in lower altitudes in the northern part of its habitat. Just like many of the other Panthera cats it is a pretty rare cat, and it was classified as Endangered until yesterday.

A snow leopard in Afghanistan. Image is Public Domain.

The official global Red List is made by the IUCN, and they have several categories to classify the degree of threat to the survival of the species. The most extreme is “critically endangered”, followed by “endangered”. As of yesterday the snow leopards were downgraded to be “vulnerable”. This means that their species has a higher expected probability of surviving for the next 100 years without human interventions, but it is still far from 100 % secure.

As of now we expect to have around 4,000 snow leopards left in the entire world, which is pretty few considering the fact that they inhabits such a huge area. Some reports gives us a bit higher number, such as 8,000 individuals, but the 4,000 one is the generally agreed upon number. According to UICN they would require it to be less than 2,500 for it to be "critically endangered".

Image is Public Domain.

Are we able to save the snow leopard?

There are lots of different conservation efforts in place to help the snow leopard survive, and these are the major reason why the snow leopard got downgraded from “endangered” to “vulnerable”. However, we really need these efforts to continue, because the species is likely to not be completely self-sustainable as of right now.

Conserving a species that uses a large area is incredible difficult. In the case of the snow leopard we need to conserve the species in countries such as China, Afghanistan, Mongolia, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Nepal and more, and getting all the 11 different countries to agree on a conservation plan can be really challenging.

Luckily the snow leopard is somewhat easy to breed in captivity, so there are several breeding programs in place. In these facilities, grown snow leopards are mated and raise the offspring, which in then released into the wild at a suitable age. Some might argue that this not the best strategy for keeping a species alive, and I agree, but I don’t think the snow leopard would have anything close to the 4,000 individuals it currently has if it had not been for the breeding programs.

Thanks for reading

Thanks for reading my short post about the declassification of the snow leopard. I really hope this species is able to keep getting a higher population, and one day it might even be classified as “Least Concern”! If you want to read more, check out the official IUCN article about the snow leopard or check out panthera.org’s short interview with IUCN about why it got downgraded!

About the author

Hi, I’m @valth! I live in Norway with my wife, our baby, and our two dogs; one of which is seen wearing a bow tie in the profile picture!

I am very passionate about nature and biology, and have been studying ecology for a few years now. My passions are mostly within conservation biology, mycology (the studies of mushrooms), botany, animal behavior and general microbiology. I really enjoy both the theoretical aspect, as well as the more practical aspect of biology, and I spend about as much time in front of biology textbooks as I do spend on finding and identifying plant, mushroom and animal species in the forests.

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