A new species of wild feline has been discovered in Bolivia, a first in the world in more than a century, one of the Bolivian scientists who participated in this discovery announced to AFP.
With a spotted coat and measuring some 45 centimeters long, the small animal was identified in the mountainous region of Los Yungas, about 90 kilometers northeast of La Paz. It was baptized by the locals as “tilcayo”, a name which inspired its new scientific name, “leopardus tilcayo”.
This is a “landmark because in 100 years no new wild cat has been described in the world,” said Ms. Nogales, a National Geographic explorer. The last to be discovered was the Uruguayan pampas cat in 1923.
The tilcayo “is a little smaller than a domestic cat, it has rounded ears” and a spotted coat, she said.
Mistaken for an ordinary cat, a male tilcayo was adopted by a family who, noticing that he did not behave normally, handed him over to an animal conservation shelter. Another specimen, a female, was rescued after being attacked in a village and then released.
The couple underwent extensive genetic analysis and the research results were published Thursday in the scientific journal “Current Biology.”
The species has, for the moment, only been detected in Bolivia, said Ms. Nogales, according to whom it is “threatened with extinction”.
