Runa and Kata explore the forest. Their spotted coats blend in with the leaves.
Runa and Kata nuzzle each other. They are as soft and cuddly as pet kittens.
March 2009, Assam, India
People watched their step in the Assam (sounds like ah-SAHM) jungle in northeast India. Roads were few and made of dirt. Trees grew so close together they almost touched. And bushy plants and fallen logs covered the forest floor. You never knew when a hungry tiger or slithering python might surprise you. This place was wild. It belonged to the animals.
Two of those animals lay sleeping in a hollow tree. They were newborn kittens, or cubs. Their mother had left them alone while she went hunting for food. The cubs should have been safe. Except before the mama returned, some woodcutters came.
The woodcutters lived in a village on the edge of the forest, in a part of India called Kokrajhar (sounds like co-kruh-JAR). They earned money by gathering firewood to sell. One man saw the hollow tree. He chopped it down with his ax. The tree landed with a thud. Then he got a big surprise.
Two tiny furballs bounced out! The startled woodcutter dropped his ax. He scooped up the tiny cats. They mewed softly. Their gray spotted coats felt as soft as a baby chick. What are they? the man wondered. Baby tigers or baby leopards?
It didn’t matter. The cubs were adorable. And there was no danger in picking them up. The babies’ eyes hadn’t even opened yet. If only I could sell these cats, he thought.
The woodcutter was very poor. He knew that wild-animal dealers would pay big money for the cubs. Then the dealers would sell the cubs for even more money. Rich collectors from other countries paid thousands of dollars for wild animals to put in their backyard zoos.
Even if no dealers came along, the cubs were a good find. Maybe the woodcutter could sell them as pets. Or his neighbors might buy them. Some men tied animal parts to their swords. This was a custom, or tradition, in his village. Some people hung animal skins up to decorate their huts. Local healers also used animal parts to make medicine.
The woodcutter knew it was wrong to capture wild animals. It was wrong to sell them too. The Indian government had laws against these things. But the thought of all the money he could make dazzled him. What if he could make $200 selling the cubs? That would be like winning the lottery! With that much money he could feed his family for many months.
Did You Know?
There are 37 different kinds of cats. The biggest are tigers, lions, leopards, jaguars, cheetahs, and pumas.
The woodcutter carried the cubs home. Then he quietly spread the word. He had jungle cats for sale.
But his plan went wrong. He didn’t know how to take care of the cubs. He didn’t know how to feed them. Or even what to feed them! Another villager became worried. He told a forest department worker named Akhim (sounds like ah-KEEM) about the cubs. Akhim went to the woodcutter. He demanded the kittens. The woodcutter turned them over.
Akhim rushed the baby cats to the local wildlife rescue center. It was run by the Wildlife Trust of India. It was not a moment too soon. The cubs hadn’t eaten in days. “One of them was seriously sick,” says Sonali Ghosh (sounds like so-NAH-lee GOUSH). Sonali is an officer with the Indian Forest Service. “I was scared it might die,” she said.
The rescue center veterinarians (sounds like vet-er-ih-NARE-ee-ens) examined the baby cats. “These are common leopards,” the vets decided. The common leopard is the kind most “commonly” seen. There are also snow leopards, clouded leopards, and Sunda clouded leopards.
Everyone at the rescue center treated the cubs with great care. Workers fed the kittens around the clock. They gave them goat’s milk, using baby bottles.
Leopards are meat-eaters. So the vets wanted the cubs to get a taste for meat. After about three weeks, the workers started mixing liver soup in with the goat’s milk.
The cubs ate a lot. They grew fast. As they got bigger, the markings on their coats became easier to see. One day the vets noticed something very interesting. The spots on these cubs looked different from the spots on common leopards. They were darker and grayer.
Did You Know?
As babies, clouded leopards have blue eyes. Later their eyes turn yellow.
The vets looked at each other. They wondered …
Could it be?
Yes! These cubs weren’t common leopards after all. They were clouded leopards. Extremely rare, almost never seen, clouded leopards!
Clouded leopards and common leopards are both big cats. But they are not the same kind, or species (sounds like SPEE-sheez), of cat. They are as different from each other as lions are from tigers.
COMMON LEOPARDS
• Live in forests, plains, deserts, and mountains in parts of Africa, Central Asia, India, and China.
• Roar loudly.
• Weigh up to 106 pounds (48 kg).
• Are covered with small, dark-colored, round spots.
• Have feet that always face front.
COMMON LEOPARD
CLOUDED LEOPARD
CLOUDED LEOPARDS
• Live in tropical forests in Southeast Asia and India.
• Purr and meow.
• Weigh up to 50 pounds (22.7 kg).
• Are covered with large spots that look like brown and gray clouds.
• Can turn their hind feet so they face backward.
The higher the better for clouded leopard cubs! They play, eat, and rest up in the treetops.
Clouded leopards are very shy. They spend a lot of their time high up in trees. They are rarely seen in the wild.
The fact that these rescued cubs were clouded leopards changed everything. If they had been common leopards, the vets would have had to send them to a zoo. It’s the law in India. That’s because hand-raised common leopards lose their fear of humans. They might attack people if they were set free.
But clouded leopards don’t bother humans. They hang out in treetops. Releasing hand-raised clouded leopards back into the wild would be OK. It would not put humans at risk.
But could these animals make it without their mother? Could they learn to protect themselves? Could they find their own food?
Bhaskar Choudhury (sounds like