| Species
First of all, do you understand what a 'species' of animal
is? Let's give you some examples: tigers, lions,
leopards and lynx are all types of wild cats but
they are sufficiently different from one another
to be called separate species.
Even if they shared the same wild habitat their behavior
and physical shape is so different from one another
they would not be able to mate and produce offspring
in the wild. For example, a tiger (Panthera tigris)
in Asia would not pick a leopard (Panthera pardus)
as a mate even if they shared the same territory.
Subspecies
Let look at a specific species,
like a leopard (Panthera pardus)! The leopard
has the widest distribution of all wild cats. It is
found in the deserts of Africa to the jungles of South
East Asia to the cold area of Eastern Russia. Because
the leopard lives in these different geographic areas
they have different physical characteristics. They
are still of the species "leopard" but the
leopards of the deserts will have short and light colored
fur. Whereas the cats from Eastern Russia will
have longer and darker fur to be able to survive cold
winters. Therefor to be a subspecies it must be: (a)geographically
distinct (b) a population and not a single individual;
(c)different from other geographic populations.
Scientific Names
You and I, and almost everyone, use a common
name for all the species of wild cats. We
call them 'tigers', 'lions', 'leopards', 'snow leopards',
'bob cats', 'clouded leopards', 'jaguars' and so
on. There are 37 different species of wild cats in
all!
Scientists also give each species a Latin
name. Latin names are very useful because there
can be many common names for
the same cat! For example, the mountain lion is also
called a puma, cougar, catamount, ghost cat, painter
and panther! And that's just in North America! Having
just one Latin name for a species avoids confusion.
- Scientists call a leopard Panthera
pardus.
- A snow leopard is
Uncia uncia
- A clouded leopard is Neofelis
nebulosa
Sometimes scientists need to be
more specific with regards to the species. We add the
subspecies name after the species name.
- Panthera pardus orientalis is
a Amur leopard
- Panthera pardus saxicolor is a Persian leopard
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