Snow Leopard

Imogene Cancellare, a Ph.D. student at the University of Delaware and Panthera collaborator, studies snow leopard genetics. Learn more about her trip to Kyrgyzstan in 2019 to collect snow leopard scat samples and the exciting findings of her study. We hope you enjoy this World Snow Leopard Day blog. 

February 14, 2022

Today is Valentine’s Day! On this romantic date, we’re showing our love for wild cats. And if you don’t have a special someone to spend the day with, we’ve got you covered. Check out these big cat dating profiles and see who you’re most compatible with. Love is in the air!

Panthera’s 2020 Annual Report looks back at a year that was painful, perplexing and unprecedented. Yet, with our supporters behind us, together we protected wild cats in parks emptied of tourists, advanced techniques to study and protect cats and aided communities around the world as they faced economic and natural disasters. Download the 2020 Annual Report here. 

May 11, 2020

The Valley of the Cats may sound like a mythical place but in reality, it’s a real-life haven for studying snow leopards on the Tibetan Plateau. We know that a lack of poaching due to local Buddhist beliefs combined with responsible ecotourism contributes to the healthy population of these elusive cats. In return, the cats serve as ghostlike sentinels for the health of these pristine ecosystems. What we don’t know, and are aiming to find out, is the relationship snow leopards have with the local landscape.

The snow leopard is a notoriously elusive species, inhabiting some of the most remote and inaccessible tracts of Central and South Asia. However, in northern India where snow leopard densities are among the highest in the world, tourists and local people can catch glimpses of the magnificent cat throughout the winter months. Snow leopard tourism is growing fast in the region, and most of the tourists wonder about the cat's whereabouts.

April 25, 2018

Thanks to the committed efforts of dozens of people, 2017 was an eventful year for Panthera’s Snow Leopard Ecology Study in Kyrgyzstan. Over the course of four months and two expeditions—and in spite of record snowfalls, rivers swollen dangerously with snowmelt, temperatures as cold as -30° C, more than a few technological mishaps, and one debilitating (but, thankfully, recoverable) injury—the project team managed to deploy GPS collars on two more snow leopards, tracking their location at intervals as short as every two hours.

Editor’s Note: Snow Leopard Conservancy-India Trust is an affiliate organization of Panthera.

Residents of Ladakh, India, have become partners in big cat conservation, thanks to the gentle nature and tourism appeal of snow leopards.

It also helps that the region’s Buddhist people abhor taking any life.

Today, the snow leopard was delivered a piece of good news: The most respected international nature conservation body re-assessed it from the category of “Endangered” to “Vulnerable.” But many scientists are urging extreme caution, warning that these iconic symbols of Asia’s great mountain wilderness still face numerous threats. Panthera spoke with Dr. Tom McCarthy, Executive Director of our Snow Leopard Program and a member of the assessment team, to break down the implications of the big cat’s status change.

The “Ghost Cat” is real. This moniker for the snow leopard makes sense; they are rarely seen in the wild with the naked eye, but if you know where to look and what to look for in the 12 Central Asian countries they occupy, you can find evidence of their presence. Well-placed remote cameras provide glimpses, but only one thing gives a complete picture of a snow leopard’s life: a GPS tracking collar.