Latest news with #jaguar
Daily Mail
15-07-2025
- Daily Mail
OnlyFans model gets very light sentence for selling jaguar cub to man she met online
An OnlyFans model who posed provocatively with wild animals has avoided jail after selling a jaguar cub to a drug dealer she met online - forcing the endangered cat into a series of shady sales, neglect, and abandonment. Trisha Denise Meyer, 43, of Houston, was sentenced Monday to six months' probation after pleading guilty to selling the cub, then named Amador, for $26,000 and illegally shipping it from Texas to California in 2021. She faced up to eight years in prison and a $700,000 fine, but prosecutors accepted a plea deal in which she copped to just one count and was ordered to pay $30,000 in restitution. The jaguar was bought by Abdul 'Mannie' Rahman, a marijuana dealer in Murrieta, California, who renamed it Hades and kept it in his five-bedroom home before reselling it to another man living with a pregnant partner. Concerned about having a jaguar around a newborn, the second buyer eventually dumped the cub - malnourished, covered in feces, and missing clumps of fur - at a wildlife sanctuary near San Diego. Now renamed Eddie, the cub lives safely at Lions Tigers & Bears sanctuary in Alpine, California. In one 2021 video, Meyer posted a clip Amador licking at the air while lying on her lap. 'thankful to be his momma #catmom,' she wrote. She even posed with the cub between her exposed breasts on OnlyFans. Rahman, who attended one of Meyer's $1,000-an-hour hotel meetups in Austin, told the Los Angeles Times: 'All I knew was the jaguar was cute, and I had the money, and I wanted it.' 'When I'm getting offered to buy a wild animal, and it's so cute when you see it, when it's small, who the f*** is gonna say no? No one will.' After Rahman posted photos of the cub online, Meyer allegedly texted him: 'If I got word of it here. That means others are seeing that & will snitch and they will be trying to track him down.' Eventually, social media clips of the cub caught the attention of sanctuary founder Bobbi Brink. 'All we knew at that point was that there was a jaguar in Riverside,' said California Fish and Wildlife warden Austin Smith. Federal law prohibits transporting endangered species across state lines - and California bans jaguar ownership outright. Brink said when the cub was dropped off in a dog crate. 'He was shaking and urinating in fear.' The staff named him Eddie after the construction worker who found him. Experts confirmed the jaguar's identity using influencer videos. 'It's pretty horrific to see that and to know that that happens,' said Mathias Tobler of the San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance. 'People treating him like a little pet cat and passing him around for entertainment.' Lead investigator Ed Newcomer of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service added: 'They are not animal lovers.' 'They are either in it for the money or they're in it for the obsession of collecting and owning and having and controlling.' Newcomer eventually traced the seller to Meyer. 'Instantly he said, 'That's Trish Meyer. We have been after her for years. She is notorious,' he recalled. A federal grand jury indicted Meyer in October 2022. She turned herself in after more than a month on the run. Rahman was also charged and sentenced in July 2023 to a year of probation and ordered to pay $30,000 in restitution. Meyer, who dubbed herself the 'Texas Zookeeper,' was no stranger to law enforcement. In 2016, she was arrested in Nevada with three tigers roaming the backyard. She was charged with child endangerment after a game warden saw her 14-year-old daughter petting tiger cubs, but the charge was later dropped. 'My child was never in danger, none of my four children have ever been in danger,' Meyer told a reporter after pleading guilty to a related theft charge involving a Savannah kitten. 'Nobody's been hurt by our animals.' She called her kids 'young zookeepers,' and said teachers referred to her as the 'tiger mom.' Despite a ban on selling exotic animals, Meyer continued. In one case, she was accused of selling a diseased kitten that died of emaciation. In another, she allegedly sold a wild Geoffroy's cat disguised as a Bengal, which attacked the buyer. Despite her past, Meyer remains active on Instagram under the name @mimisexoticworld, where she now posts photos with a white tiger, lemur, and exotic birds. Her bio reads: 'I no longer sell animals.' Eddie, now weighing 118 pounds, lives in an enclosure with grass, climbing platforms, and a pool - next to a retired movie bear and a lion once used in entertainment. 'It's their forever home,' said sanctuary keeper John Schorman. 'It's a privilege watching all the animals thrive.'
Yahoo
01-07-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Not today! Alert capybara escapes stalking jaguar at last second
In the Pantanal Sul in Brazil, a jaguar crept up on a capybara during a safari tour at the end of May. But just before the big cat could strike, the capybara reacted.
Times
06-06-2025
- Lifestyle
- Times
17 of the best places to see wildlife in Costa Rica
Land of tropical rainforests, cloud-covered volcanoes and Caribbean and Pacific coasts that form a highway for migrating whales, Costa Rica is an intensely rewarding destination for wildlife lovers. Around half a million species of wild animals await in its national parks, wildlife refuges, biological reserves and protected areas designed to promote ecotourism. Thanks to anti-logging laws brought in by the government in the 80s and 90s, Central America's 'rich coast' is the first tropical country to have reversed deforestation, returning 60 per cent of its terrain to tree cover. Which is good news not just for travellers hoping to enjoy sightings of creatures such as the emoji-inspiring blue morpho butterfly, giant anteater and jaguar in their natural habitats, but for the planet, too. This article contains affiliate links, which may earn us revenue The sloth is a Costa Rican curiosity: though they spend most of their lives in the trees, evolutionarily speaking they're actually most closely related to the anteater. Two types of sloth can be seen creeping around the treetops: the three-toed and two-toed sloth. Their favourite food is the cecropia tree, so theoretically they can be seen anywhere the tree grows. For a reliable sighting, look for them particularly in the canopy of the popular Parque Nacional Manuel Antonio, three hours' south of San Jose, or better still in the forests of the Osa Peninsula on the Pacific coast. For sighting certainty, visit the Sloth Sanctuary, 30 minutes south of the east-coast city of Limon, where rescued sloths live out their days in safety. Sanctuary staff offer excellent talks and tours. • Discover our full guide to Costa Rica The cheeky capuchin has a reputation for dexterity thanks to its astonishingly mobile prehensile tail, which it essentially uses as an extra limb. They're easily identified thanks to their shaggy white face and shoulders. Keep your eye on them; they're also notorious pickpockets and will happily pinch anything they can get their little hands on. Howler monkeys are the foghorns of the tropical forest, with a distinctive whooping call that echoes for miles through the canopy. Both monkeys are common, especially inside national parks, but the forested slopes around Volcan Arenal are generally less crowded than the better-known parks. Surely the showiest bird in Costa Rica is the extravagantly coloured (and equally extravagantly named) resplendent quetzal, with its gleaming green plumage and crimson breast. Its feathers were prized by the Aztecs and Mayans, and the bird also had mythological significance. The prime time for viewing is the breeding season between March and June; try the Monteverde Cloud Forest, or better still the Parque Nacional Los Quetzales, a 50 sq km patch of cloud forest on the flanks of the Cordillera de Talamanca, about 120km southeast of San Jose. Cahuita can be busy, but for a quick nature hit it's great — it has a mix of ecosystems, including coast, beach, reef and rainforest. Iguanas can be seen lounging around on logs and basking on the riverbanks, especially early in the day when they need to warm up their blood. Cahuita is also an important turtle nesting site. Avoid weekends, which can be overcrowded — early mornings or late evenings during the week are usually quieter. Is this Costa Rica's cutest monkey? Many people think so, thanks to their diminutive dimensions and playful antics: they like to wander around in family groups and watching them interact with each other is enormously entertaining. They primarily live on the Pacific coast: the Nicoya Peninsula and Parque Nacional Manuel Antonio have decent numbers, although the monkeys are more shy than capuchins and howler monkeys, meaning you'll have to be patient if you want to see them. This bright blue butterfly — between 12.5cm and 20cm wide — is one of Costa Rica's largest. It's a beautiful presence in many of the country's forests, but it can be tricky to see them in the wild, so visiting a dedicated butterfly observatory or breeding centre is usually a better bet. Blue morphos can be seen at the Butterfly Conservatory in El Castillo and the excellent Ecocentro Danaus in La Fortuna, which is also a good place to see poison dart frogs. Crocodiles and caimans can be spotted all across Costa Rica's lowland wetlands on both coasts, with the crocs reaching up to a colossal 6m in length and caimans (distinguishable by their shorter, wider snout) usually shorter. But for a surefire, up-close encounter with the crocodylus acutus, head to the Tarcoles River, whose brackish waters and pebbly banks are home to one of the largest American crocodile populations in the world. Crocodile Bridge, on Route 34, around a 90-minute drive south of San Jose and half an hour north of surf town Jaco, offers a thrilling vantage point, as well as a cluster of pit stop-friendly soda restaurants, ice-cream parlours and souvenir shops. While not as cute as the squirrel monkey or show-stopping as the jaguar, the blue land crab, aka Halloween, whitespot, moon or harlequin crab, serves up one of Costa Rica's most surprising wildlife 'wows'. Emerging in their droves after dark — all powerful purple claws, orange legs and ghostly yellow spots that resemble eyes — they mobilise noisily through the steamy coastal jungle within 1km of the country's Pacific coast (the Osa Peninsula and Playa Uvita being hotspots), marching determinedly over anything that gets in their way, including the feet of any passing humans. The engineers of the tropical rainforest ecosystem, they play a crucial role in driving tree renewal through aerating the soil, removing leaf litter and creating carbon-rich microhabitats. This west-coast marine park, and the spit of land to the south (especially around Drake Bay) are whale-watching hotspots. These mighty mammals migrate to Costa Rica's Pacific coast to breed and give birth — very unusually, from both the northern and southern hemispheres, giving an unusually long whale-watching season. July to November is the peak time for the southern migration, when whales travel from as far away as Antarctica, while December to April is the peak time for the northern migration, mainly from the waters of the northwest US and Canada. Operators accredited by Certificación para la Sostenibilidad Turística (CST), a government-controlled rating system for sustainable practices, include Ballena Aventura, Dolphin Tour and Ballena Infocenter. • Discover the best places in the world for whale-watching There are 18 different parrot species in Costa Rica, but most distinctive of all is the scarlet macaw, whose flame-feathered finery makes them easy to spot (you'll hear them long before you see them as they're also famous for their screechingly loud squawk). Scarlet macaws are fairly easy to see in Parque Nacional Carara and around the Osa Peninsula, but their cousins, the great green macaws, are altogether rarer: only around 500 of these birds remain, mainly in the forests of the north and Caribbean coast, especially around Tortuguero. To support macaw conservation, visit the excellent Punta Islita Wild Macaw Reserve on the Nicoya Peninsula; tours are run by staff from the Macaw Recovery Network. It must be the busiest bird in existence — and Costa Rica is home to more than 50 species of hummingbird. They're a vital part of the ecosystem, pollinating many types of flowers and plants, including rare endemic orchids. Costa Rica's unique cloud forests are the top places to see them — particularly at Reserva Biologica Bosque Nuboso Monteverde (the Monteverde Cloud Forest Biological Reserve), an oasis of biodiversity established in the 1970s in the mountains inland from Puntarenas by a partnership between scientists and indigenous people. Professional naturalists lead tours into the reserve, which also has its own basic residential lodge if you feel like spending more time here. The reserve is roughly equidistant from San Jose and Liberia. These prodigiously beaked birds are distinctive, but you'll need expertise to tell the six different species apart. Best-known is the keel-billed, or rainbow-billed toucan, which has the classic multicoloured beak. Different species concentrate in different areas: for keel-billed toucan and yellow-eared toucanets try Parque Nacional Manuel Antonio; for fiery-billed aracari and chestnut-mandibled toucans, head to Tortuguero or Parque Nacional Corcovado; for collared toucans try Cahuita; and for emerald toucanets go to the Monteverde Cloud Forest. The waterways of this tropical coastal park are home to a prodigious variety of life. Crocodiles and caimans lounge around on the banks, spider monkeys frolic through the trees and tree frogs can be spied in the foliage, but the park's prize animals are the green sea turtles, for whom the park is an important nesting site. Prized by unscrupulous collectors, the eggs are protected by coastal rangers and conservation staff as well as an army of volunteers (it's a popular place for an eco holiday). July and August are the peak months for turtles, but the season often runs into October. The park is best explored by kayak or canoe — you'll feel like Indiana Jones paddling along its creeper-covered backwaters. Covering more than two-fifths of the Osa Peninsula, Corcovado is as close as Costa Rica gets to the Garden of Eden. This magnificent tropical rainforest is one of the few remnants of the primary tropical forest that once cloaked much of Central America. As such, it's also a precious oasis of biodiversity and a refuge for many of the rarest and most endangered animals in Costa Rica, including the Baird's tapir, the giant anteater and, most charismatic and elusive of all, the jaguar. They're incredibly hard to spot, and extremely rare, so you will almost certainly need an experienced local guide — and a massive dose of luck — to see one. But don't be disappointed if you don't: Corcovado's incredible wildlife astounds, even by Costa Rican's stellar standards. Lodges such as Ecoturístico La Tarde can put you in touch with local nature guides. For a 100 per cent guaranteed cat-sighting, head for the Las Pumas Rescue Centre, which rehabilitates cats before returning them back to the wild. These great ocean cruisers — the largest fish on the planet — can reach 18m in length and weigh in excess of 30 tons. They can be elusive visitors in Costa Rica, although most often show up in the waters off the Reserva Biologica Isla del Canõ. Diving and snorkelling operators are your best bet for seeing them: try Bahia Aventuras in Uvita, who also run whale and dolphin-spotting tours into Parque Nacional Marino Ballena. Legendary for its waterbirds — and its voracious mosquitoes — this 198 sq km wetland at the head of the Golfo de Nicoya offers a variety of habitats, including mangrove forests, savannahs, marshes and coastal woodlands. It's brilliant for birders, with everything from egrets and spoonbills to storks, ibises and night herons flocking here: December to March, the dry season, is best for bird-spotting, as species cluster together in smaller areas. The park also has Costa Rica's largest population of jaguarundi, the slender wild cats whose long tail and small head give rise to its nickname of 'otter cat'. Boat tours and night-time wildlife walks can be arranged through the OTS Hacienda Palo Verde Ranger Station. Related to the raccoon, but with a longer snout and skinnier tail, coatis (or coatimundis) can be spied nosing around in the undergrowth pretty much everywhere you travel in Costa Rica, especially in early morning and late evening. They're cute, but they can be a bit of a nuisance, raiding bins and unguarded food, so resist the temptation to feed them. • Best hotels in Costa Rica• Best time to visit Costa Rica• The best of Central America Overtourism and unscrupulous operators are as rife in Costa Rica as anywhere, which is why it's doubly important to research your experiences carefully before choosing. It's a bit of a minefield, but in general: • Look for a high 'leaf' rating from the CST. Five leaves is best. • Enquire about partnerships with local conservation groups and ecotourism initiatives. • Aim to choose a business that has good grassroots connections and employs local workers. • Ask lots of questions. If the business can't answer them satisfactorily, look elsewhere. Try to get recommendations from reliable sources, such as conservation charities and ecotourism specialists. Additional reporting by Imogen Lepere and Julie Alpine
Yahoo
01-06-2025
- General
- Yahoo
What's the difference between a leopard and a jaguar?
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. A large predator lurks in the brush, flashing a long tail and fur printed with telltale black and tan rosettes. It must surely be a leopard. Or … could it be a jaguar? With their stealthy hunting habits and similar builds, patterns and hues, the two large cats can be strikingly difficult to tell apart. What, in fact, is the difference between a leopard and a jaguar? To begin with, they live in completely different parts of the world, with jaguars found in the Americas today, and leopards occurring across a large range spanning Africa, parts of the Middle East and Asia. "They're on the opposite sides of the globe, but a long time ago they shared a common ancestor," Allison Devlin, jaguar program director for Panthera, the global wild cat conservation organization, told Live Science. Jaguars and leopards are part of the Panthera genus, which also includes lions, tigers and snow leopards. Tigers and snow leopards form their own branch of the Panthera family tree, while leopards, jaguars and lions are grouped together on another branch because they descend from a separate common ancestor. However, between 3.6 million and 2.5 million years ago, jaguars split from the common ancestor shared by their leopard and lion cousins. The origins of the Panthera genus are uncertain, but fossil evidence shows that jaguars dispersed across the Eurasian plateau about 2 million years ago, and from here they migrated across the Bering Land Bridge during the last ice age to North America, and eventually down into Mexico through South America, where this species occurs today. In fact jaguars are the only Panthera lineage that occurs in the Western Hemisphere, and exist as just one species across their entire range, Devlin said. Meanwhile, leopards split off from their closer relatives, lions, about 2 million years ago, and spread into Africa, Southeast and Northeast Asia, where they occur as eight regional subspecies across this range today. This evolutionary history means that leopards and jaguars are different species that aren't even each other's closest relative, despite their striking similarities. Most noticeable among these common features is their spots, but even these have subtle differences that can be used to tell the animals apart. "The rosettes on the jaguar quite often have spots in the middle of them, whereas the leopard doesn't," Tara Pirie, a lecturer in ecology and conservation at the University of Surrey in the U.K., told Live Science. She shared another clue: "[Leopard] rosettes are tightly packed, whereas the jaguar, with the spot in the middle, their rosettes are quite large and not as tightly packed." Related: What's the difference between apes and monkeys? Their shared ancestry might partly explain why these two remote species both have spots. But it could also be an adaptive response to the environments they live in, a phenomenon known as convergent evolution, Devlin explained. Rosettes, spots and other light-and-dark mixed patterns are in fact quite common in felid predators that live in partly-shaded landscapes, where their spots help keep them camouflaged. Jaguars and leopards both occur in places with partial forest cover, and both animals also rely on ambush tactics to hunt. So their coats provide critical camouflage enabling them to sneak up and pounce on prey at close range, Devlin said. There are, however, some key differences in their hunting styles that also reveal striking physiological distinctions between the two animals. "The way I think of it is that a leopard is built more like your all-around athlete. They can climb trees, they can run, they can ambush," Devlin said. "For jaguars, they're built more like a bodybuilder, where they're heavier in the barrel, in the chest and in the head. And part of that is related to their hunting techniques." Jaguars are real heavyweights that can reach up to 260 pounds (120 kilograms). Their generally stockier frames include a much bulkier head than leopards have, formed by larger bones that support bigger muscles and give this animal some of the strongest jaws in the cat family, Devlin said. Whereas most cats kill their prey through strangulation or breaking the neck, the jaguar's powerful bite gives it the extraordinary ability to kill its prey by puncturing the skull. Their bite is so strong that they can crush through the upper shells of tortoises and sea turtles, both of which they target as prey, Devlin explained. On the other hand, at a much lighter 176 pounds (80 kg), leopards kill prey through suffocation, by biting the throat. Their smaller frames allow them to spring up into trees — something that jaguars can also do, although in general they spend far less time in trees. The leopard's arboreal preferences, meanwhile, have given them the advantage of being able to store or "cache" prey away from others' prying eyes, Pirie said. Up in the canopy, the leopard's nimble-footed ways are helped along by another key tell that separates them from jaguars: a lengthier tail. "Whereas in the leopard, it could be up to a meter [3.2 feet long], in the jaguar it is maybe 60 centimeters [1.9 feet]. So even just that 40 centimeters [1.3 feet] could bring a lot more balance," Pirie said. With these features as a guide, it's just about possible to tell leopards and jaguars apart. But nature has one more trick up her sleeve: all-black leopards and jaguars. The satiny sable coats on these animals are caused by a genetic mutation, and while they might look like it, they are not a different species. In fact, they're what's known as the "melanistic phase" of the species in each case, according to Devlin. RELATED MYSTERIES —Why do cats' claws retract but dogs' claws don't? —Why are tigers orange? —Did cats really disappear from North America for 7 million years? Interestingly, in both leopards and jaguars, these darker cats appear more commonly in heavily-shaded habitats. Black jaguars occur more in the dimly-lit depths of the Amazon rainforest, Devlin said. Meanwhile "you've got leopards over in [the Malaysian jungle], they tend to be melanistic … which would help blend them in with that dense habitat," Pirie said. The rarity of melanistic leopards and jaguars makes them even more vulnerable than their regularly-spotted siblings, who are threatened by hunting, shrinking habitats and the illegal wildlife trade. As a result, jaguars and leopards share the unfortunate fact that their populations are both in decline, according to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. But we have the tools to change that, Devlin said. "If they have the habitat, the prey and the protection that they need, they can persist."
Yahoo
11-05-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Trail camera captures striking glimpse of elusive jungle predator with rare coloring: 'So breathtaking'
A trail camera captured an incredible picture of a black jaguar, giving the world a glimpse of a beautiful beast with rare coloring. As Outdoors reported, the photo shows a melanistic jaguar, meaning it has an increased amount of dark pigmentation. The animal is sitting and staring directly at the camera, seemingly posing for a portrait in Mamiraua, a portion of the Amazon rainforest in Brazil. The World Wildlife Fund shared the photo on its United Kingdom Instagram page, and it quickly became a fan favorite. The post received thousands of likes, and commenters called the image "gorgeous" and "so breathtaking." In the same post, the organization shared a photo of a jaguar with more common coloring, vividly highlighting the differences between the two animals' appearances. According to the WWF, researchers have used trail cameras for 15 years to study jaguar populations throughout the Amazon. The 22 areas studied, which cover 2.5% of the Amazon basin, are home to more than 6,000 jaguars. Jaguars are listed as Near Threatened on the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List of Threatened Species. "Today, nearly 45% of all jaguars live in protected areas, but deforestation continues to fragment their habitat, leaving many populations isolated," the WWF wrote. "With data from camera trap research like this, WWF aims to stabilize and increase jaguar populations by 2030." Trail cameras have become vital tools for ecological research, as they allow scientists to survey difficult-to-reach spots for extended periods with minimal resources. They provide valuable insight into what happens in specific habitats when humans aren't around. In recent months, they have spotted a rare jaguarundi in Honduras and a clouded leopard in the Himalayas. They have also provided evidence of a potential freshwater turtle comeback in Australia and caught incredible footage of a chimpanzee using a tool in Gabon. Do you think America does a good job of protecting its natural beauty? Definitely Only in some areas No way I'm not sure Click your choice to see results and speak your mind. Join our free newsletter for good news and useful tips, and don't miss this cool list of easy ways to help yourself while helping the planet.
