Clouded Leopard (Neofelis nebulosa)
AFP
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DHAKA (AFP) – Bangladeshi conservationists said Thursday the
discovery of a rare leopard captured by villagers in the southeast
of the country renewed hopes for the survival of the critically
endangered species.
Professor Anwarul Islam, chief executive of Wildlife
Trust of Bangladesh, said the three-month-old
clouded leopard cub had been released back into the wild.
t had been caged by villagers in the remote Chittagong
Hill Tracts region, which borders Myanmar and
Mizoram state in India, for the past three weeks, he said.
"Locals stumbled upon two cubs and their mother eating a monkey
in the district of Rangimati three weeks ago. They were only able
to capture one cub," he said
"It was tremendous news because many conservationists thought
the animal was extinct from Bangladesh due to habitat loss."
He said in most cases where a rare species is captured,
villagers sell the animal, but in this case conservationists had
convinced them to release it back into the wild.
The species is timid and nocturnal and little is known about it,
he added.
The clouded leopard is listed as critically
endangered by the International Union for Conservation of
Nature, with 100,000 of the species believed to still be
living worldwide.
It is mainly found in South and Southeast Asian
countries, and the last reported sightings of the animal in
Bangladesh were in 1992 and 2005.
That's one good news among the many disheartening ones.
