Given our mutual love of biological diversity I thought I would post this:
"Arizona Game and Fish Department officials captured, collared and released the
first
jaguar found in Arizona borders Wednesday.
The 118-pound male cat was found in a lug hold snare set out by department
officials and
fitted with a satellite-tracking collar and released.
Terry Johnson, Endangered Species Specialist at the Arizona Game and Fish
Department,
said the jaguar was confirmed by his spotted pattern to be Macho B, a jaguar
that has
been photographed by trail cameras for about 13 years.
Macho B was first photographed at about two to three years old, which makes him
currently near 16 years old, Johnson said. Macho B is the oldest documented
wild jaguar in
the world.
Despite his age, Johnson said Macho B "looks in darn fine condition" and is
nearly at the
average weight of male jaguars with good muscular tone.
Since 1971, only six jaguars have been documented in the U.S. In the past 120
years, less
than 70 of these animals have been documented.
The department unsuccessfully attempted to collar a jaguar ten years ago, and
since then
have developed rules for collaring captured jaguars.
The rules call for sedation of the animal while in captivity, observation for a
minimum of
six hours, and then release back into the wild.
Since jaguar presence became known in border states, the Endangered Species Act
extended protection to U.S. jaguars in 1997.
It is unknown whether the jaguar is native to Arizona or Mexico, but Johnson
said the
collar has a special alert signal if Macho B crosses the border.
The one pound and 12 ounce collar, which was donated by North Star Science and
Technologies, will provide location points every three hours for the incredibly
rare feline,
according to Johnson.
"We have absolutely no firm information on how jaguars use land in the U.S.,"
he said.
"The collar will help verify or refute all speculations on the jaguar's habits."
Bill Van Pelt, Program Manager at the Arizona Game and Fish Department, said,
compared
to a mountain lions, jaguars are more robust, "kind of like a wrestler."
According to Van Pelt, a loose translation of the name jaguar from Native
American
dialects is "the predator that kills in one jump."
Historically, jaguar territory extended as far north as the Grand Canyon, Van
Pelt said.
They currently live predominantly in Mexico and South and Central America.
Jaguars are the third largest feline in the world, after lions and tigers, and
the only feline
on the Western Hemisphere that roars."
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