People who explore wildlife often get excited when they encounter something extremely rare. That’s exactly what happened to wildlife conservationist Russ McSpadden.
When he went to check out a trail camera for the Center for Biological Diversity, he was shocked to see a rare animal in an unexpected place. We can say it was his lucky day.
While reviewing the footage, Russ spotted an ocelot, one of only 100 ocelots in the entire United States. He couldn’t believe his eyes, sharing his excitement in a press release for the Center for Biological Diversity:
“I shouted with joy when I realized what I was seeing on the trail cam.”
But why was Russ so thrilled? The footage of this wild cat offered new hope for the survival of the species, which is extremely rare in the U.S.
Ocelots are medium-sized wild cats native to the Southwestern U.S., Mexico, and other regions. However, their population has decreased due to historic hunting, habitat fragmentation, and loss.
Before this discovery, only one known living ocelot resided in Arizona – a male named Lil’ Jefe, living near the state’s southern border.
Sadly, Lil’ Jefe had been separated from other ocelots due to the border wall between Arizona and Mexico.
Aletris Neils, executive director of conservation group CATalyst, explained in an interview:
“The wall has bisected almost perfectly what has long been the terrain of male ocelots occurring in Arizona from the terrain of female ocelots, most of them concentrated about 40 miles south, on the other side of the border.”
That means that Lil’Jefe will finally have some company. But further research revealed something even more surprising. It turned out that this new ocelot was already familiar to the wildlife centers.
McSpadden consulted with Dr. Carmina Gutierrez Gonzales of the Northern Jaguar Project. She analyzed the ocelot’s fur pattern and realized that it had been spotted multiple times in different places.
Each ocelot has unique markings, which helped Dr. Carmina recognized that this same ocelot was previously captured on a different trail camera set up by Phoenix Zoo researchers, 30 miles away.
But, that wasn’t all. The same ocelot had also been spotted traveling through the Sky Island Mountain region. Austin Nunez, chairman of the Tohono O’odham Nation’s San Xavier District, shared:
“Seeing the return of an ocelot to these ancestral lands reaffirms our sacred connection to this place and reminds us of our duty to protect these lands and the creatures that depend on them.”
Following this exciting discovery, the Center for Biological Diversity hopes to raise awareness about protecting ocelots as well as other species that live on the U.S. lands.