Happy Halloween! Let’s celebrate black cats in honor of this spooky holiday. Jaguars and leopards are both big cats that have the melanistic, or black variant, in their coat patterns (Turner, 1997). This genetic variant has been documented in 13 cat species (Parham, 2017). Researchers have found that the melanistic gene is highest with those that live in a moist forest near no open habitats (Parham, 2017). In thick habitat this allows them to blend into the dark shade, while in open habitat this makes them much easier to spot (Parham, 2017). However, this coloring is purely a genetic driven trait, but the environment can impact the frequency of these genes in the population (Zaccaria, 2019). The image below is of a melanistic leopard.
In leopards the melanistic (black) gene is recessive while the normal golden color gene is dominant, but in jaguars the melanistic gene is dominant (Zaccaria, 2019). Just because the gene is dominant does not mean the frequency of melanistic jaguars is increased (Zaccaria, 2019). Researchers believe that only about 10% of both leopard and jaguar populations have melanistic cats (Zaccaria, 2019). Although they are all black they still have rosettes, that can be seen if the sunlight hits their coat just right (Turner, 1997). With their rosettes still being visible in the right light, it indicates that there are different molecular mechanisms that code for melanism versus coat patterns, in cat species (Zaccaria, 2019). The image below is of a melanistic jaguar.
Reid Park Zoo recently lost their melanistic jaguar, in July 2019 (Grubb, 2019). Simone, the melanistic jaguar, was the oldest jaguar in any Association for Zoos and Aquariums zoo, and at 23 years old she lived a good long life at Reid Park Zoo (Grubb, 2019). Normally jaguars live to about 18 years (Grubb, 2019). Animals tend to live longer in zoos because of the diet and health care they are provided (Grubb, 2019). The video below is of a black jaguar swimming.
The San Diego Zoo has a female melanistic Amur leopard, named Mystique (Parham, 2017). The Amur leopard is critically endangered and there are an estimated 60 individuals in the wild (Parham, 2017). Below is a video of a black leopard at night.
San Diego Zoo Global found a black leopard in the wild while working on their leopard project (discussed in an earlier blog: San Diego Zoo Global’s Leopard Project) in Kenya (Pilfold, 2019). This video showed that there are melanistic leopards in the wild and that they are breeding (Pilfold, 2019). This habitat would be a habitat considered to allow the leopard to be easily seen because there is no shortage of shaded habitat (Parham, 2017; Pilfold, 2019). This individual leopard is a mother and has one ‘normal’ colored cub (golden) and one melanistic (black) colored cub (Pilfold, 2019). The researchers who found her believe she mated with a golden male who also has the recessive coloration melanistic gene resulting in one golden cub (with the dominant coloration gene) and one black cub (Pilfold, 2019). Below is a video of the black mother leopard and her two cubs.
Literature Cited:
Grubb, C. (2019, July 6). Reid park zoo says goodbye to Simone, the oldest jaguar in an AZA zoo. Reid Park Zoo Zoo Blog. https://reidparkzoo.org/blog/reid-park-zoo-says-goodbye- to-simone-the-oldest-jaguar-in-an-aza-zoo/#
Panthera. (N.D.). Black jaguars like this one are much more difficult to find and photograph in the wild than black leopards [Photograph]. Panthera. https://www.panthera.org/blog/2019/10/22/wild-cats-101-black-cats-and-more-melanism
Panthera. (N.D.). In this photo of a melanistic leopard in Malaysia, you can still see the cat’s spots underneath its dark coloring [Photograph]. Panthera. https://www.panthera.org/blog/2019/10/22/wild-cats-101-black-cats-and-more-melanism
Parham, D. (2017, December 18). She’s mysterious, magnificent, and melanistic. Meet Mystique, one of the zoo’s newest endangered Amur leopards. ZooNooz. https://zoonooz.sandiegozoo.org/zoonooz/black-beauty/
Pilfold, N. (2019, May 27). How cameras filmed a rare black leopard mother and cubs.
ZooNooz.https://zoonooz.sandiegozoo.org/2019/05/27/how-cameras-filmed-a-rare-black-leopard-mother-and-cubs/?preview=true&_thumbnail_id=129812
San Diego Zoo. (2019, May 27). Rare black leopard mother and cubs spotted in Kenya [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_AEK8tT-Ow&feature=emb_logo
San Diego Zoo. (2019, September 3). Trail camera footage: Black leopard at night [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTj6LCrXWqM&feature=emb_logo
Turner, A. (1997). The big cats and their fossil relatives (1st ed.). New York: Columbia
University Press.
World Wildlife Fund International. (2015, February 12). Rare black jaguar swimming in the Amazon [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4ZDabMNsyA
Zaccaria, J. (2019, October 28). Wild cats 101: Black cats and more on melanism. Panthera. https://www.panthera.org/blog/2019/10/22/wild-cats-101-black-cats-and-more-melanism