Is the cheetah an animal in the appendix of the Convention? At what level is the cheetah a protected animal in my country?

Simple, classification: Chordata, Mammalia, Carnivora, Felidae, Cheetah genus, Cheetah species. There are two subspecies of cheetah, one is the African subspecies and the other is the Asian subspecies. There are more African subspecies, with 9,000 to 12,000 individuals. There are relatively few Asian subspecies. It mainly lives in Iran, and there are still about 300 individuals.

The trunk length of a cheetah is 1 meter to 1.5 meters, the tail length is 0.6 meters to 0.8 meters, the shoulder height is 0.7 to 0.9 meters, and the weight is generally 35 to 72 kilograms. The male cheetah is slightly larger than the female cheetah, and the color of the cheetah's back is light yellow. Its belly is lighter in color, usually white. It has black spots all over its body, and a black stripe from the corner of its mouth to the corner of its eye. This stripe is a feature we use to distinguish cheetahs from leopards.

A monotypic species of the genus Cheetah in the carnivorous cat family. It looks like a leopard, but its body is thinner than a leopard's, its limbs are slender, and its toes and claws are straight. It cannot retract all its claws like cats. The head is small and round; the whole body is colorless and light yellow with many small black spots (see picture). Now distributed in Africa.

It inhabits dry areas with jungles or sparse forests. It usually lives alone and only pairs up during the mating season. There are also groups of 4 to 5 cubs led by a female leopard. Cheetahs are the fastest mammals and can run up to 120 kilometers per hour. Feeds on small and medium-sized animals such as antelopes. In addition to hunting by high-speed pursuit, they also adopt ambush methods, hiding in grass or bushes, and suddenly spring out to hunt when prey approaches. A female leopard gives birth to 2 to 5 cubs in one litter. Lifespan is about 15 years.

Although cheetahs are ferocious and aggressive, they are easy to tame and were used to assist hunting in ancient times. Cheetahs once had a relatively wide distribution area, inhabiting countries from the African continent to southern Asia. Due to long-term excessive hunting by humans, they are now extinct in India, Soviet Central Asia and other places, and are rare in southwestern Africa.

The cheetah is the undisputed king of sprinting in the animal world. It has been measured that an adult cheetah can reach 100 kilometers per hour in a few seconds. However, this does not guarantee that they will be foolproof in hunting. You must know that the God of nature is very fair. Although it has given them unparalleled speed, it has not also given them endurance. If the cheetah cannot capture the prey in a short distance , it will give up and wait for the next attack.

Cheetahs look little like most of their other distant cat relatives. Their heads are relatively small, and there are obvious black stripes on both sides of their noses extending from the corners of their eyes to their mouths, like two tear tracks (see the picture above, this is one of the most striking features that distinguish them from other big cats). Their bodies are slender and lean, with a body length of about 140-220cm and a height of about 75-85cm. They also have long limbs and a long tail. The cheetah's hair is light golden, dotted with black round spots, and there is a mane-like hair on its back (some species of cheetahs have quite obvious dark "manes" on their backs, and the spots on their bodies are more Large, with short stripes, this cheetah is called the "king cheetah". The king cheetah was once considered an independent subspecies, but later research found that their unique and beautiful patterns were just the product of genetic mutations). . Cheetahs' claws are somewhat similar to dog claws in that they cannot fully retract their claws into their pads like other cats, but can only retract half of them.

Due to the highly purified genes among cheetahs, skin from distant relatives can be transplanted at will without any rejection. It has also become difficult for people to classify subspecies of cheetahs. Analysis of proteins in cheetah blood shows that the differences between different cheetahs are very subtle, so the classification of cheetah subspecies has been controversial. This site currently only lists 5 types. Please see the list on the left for details.

Cheetahs are mainly distributed in Africa. They once lived in India in Asia. The cheetahs in India are also called Indian leopards (extinct). The cheetah is the fastest animal on land, reaching a speed of 120 kilometers per hour, and its acceleration is also amazing. It only takes 4 seconds to reach its maximum speed from starting point. However, it has poor stamina and cannot chase prey for long periods of time. The prey of cheetahs is mainly small and medium-sized ungulates such as Thomson's gazelle and young wildebeest. The cheetah's body has become slender in order to adapt to high-speed chasing, and its claws cannot be extended and retracted at will like other cats. Therefore, it cannot fight against other large predators such as lions and hyenas. The hard-earned prey is often snatched by them. Walk. The Maasai people in Africa are also not very friendly towards cheetahs.

The Maasai are nomadic people. They will not hunt wild animals at will because they believe that only the livestock they raise are suitable for food. However, they will use their spears to snatch away cheetah prey, not for eating, but for use. Feed the dogs so they save food for the dogs. The poor cheetah can only hunt again, but the consequence of high-speed hunting is a high loss of energy. If a cheetah fails to hunt 5 times in a row or the prey is snatched away, it may starve to death because it no longer has the strength. Hunted. The survival rate of leopard cubs is very low. Two-thirds of leopard cubs are killed by lions, hyenas, etc. or starve to death due to lack of food before they are one year old.

Our topic today is cheetah. The English name of cheetah is Cheetah. This word comes from the Hindi Chita. Cheetah means spotted. Many people may have seen cheetahs in wildlife parks. Its trunk length is 1 meter to 1.5 meters, its tail length is 0.6 meters to 0.8 meters, its shoulder height is 0.7 to 0.9 meters, and its weight is generally 35 to 72 kilograms. The male cheetah is slightly larger than the female cheetah, and the color of the cheetah's back is light yellow. Its belly is lighter in color, usually white. As we just said, the cheetah is called Cheetah, which means it has spots. So it has black spots all over its body, and a black stripe from the corner of its mouth to the corner of its eye. This stripe is a feature we use to distinguish cheetahs from leopards.

Cheetah's appearance

The appearance of cheetahs bears little resemblance to most of their other distant feline relatives. Their heads are relatively small, and there are obvious black stripes on both sides of their noses extending from the corners of their eyes to their mouths, like two tear tracks (see the picture above, this is one of the most striking features that distinguish them from other big cats). Their bodies are slender and lean, with a body length of about 140-220cm and a height of about 75-85cm. They also have long limbs and a long tail. The cheetah's hair is light golden, dotted with black round spots, and there is a mane-like hair on the back (some species of cheetahs have quite obvious dark "manes" on the back, and the spots on the body are relatively Large, with short stripes, this cheetah is called the "king cheetah". The king cheetah was once considered an independent subspecies, but later research found that their unique and beautiful patterns were just the product of genetic mutations). . Cheetahs' claws are somewhat similar to dog claws in that they cannot fully retract their claws into their pads like other cats, but can only retract half of them.

The oldest cheetah fossils in the world have been found in Texas, Nevada, and Wyoming in North America. The cheetahs at that time lived about 10,000 years ago. At that time, the world was in the last ice age on earth. During the so-called ice age, the earth's climate became colder. At both ends of the earth, the North and South Poles were covered with large areas of glaciers, which was called the ice age. During that period, cheetahs were also widely distributed in Asia, Africa, Europe and North America. When climate change during the Ice Age led to the death of large numbers of animals, cheetahs in Europe and North America, as well as cheetahs in parts of Asia and Africa, became extinct.

The lifespan of a cheetah

How long is the lifespan of a cheetah? People used radio collars to find that the life span of a cheetah in the wild is generally 6.9 years. But in captivity, a cheetah may survive for 11.7 years. The so-called radio tracking technology is to put a radio transmitter around the animal's neck, and then use one radio transmitter to mark the animal and the other to track the animal's activity range. If some radio transmitters have a long life, they can study the life span of animals.

In the animal kingdom, the systematic classification and positioning of the cheetah is as follows. It belongs to the phylum Chordata and the class Mammalia, which means it is a member of the mammals. Belonging to the order Carnivora, it is also a member of carnivores. Cat family, genus Cheetah, of which the cheetah is a species. It has two subspecies, one is African and one is Asian. There are more African subspecies, with 9,000 to 12,000 individuals. There are relatively few Asian subspecies. It mainly lives in Iran, and there are still about 300 individuals. According to biomolecular research, cheetahs, jaguars, and golden cats appeared on the earth about 5.5 million years ago. Lions, tigers, and pumas only appeared about 1.6 million years ago. Generally speaking, cheetahs cannot climb trees, unlike leopards, which can climb trees. Because its claws are on the outside, the cheetah is not good at climbing rocks, so it generally cannot climb trees. At most, it can only climb fallen logs that have fallen down.

So in Africa, sometimes we see some cats, like cheetahs. If they are resting in a tree or waiting for prey, they think they are cheetahs. In fact, they are not, they are leopards. An American scientist named Stephen has studied the population structure of many wild animals. He found that the cheetahs in the world today are all closely related individuals. In other words, these cheetahs are the offspring of closely related individuals and inbreeding. Because they are the offspring of inbreeding, their individual genetic structures are very similar, that is, their genetic makeup is very similar, at least like twins. There is a related issue here. Generally speaking, people particularly hope to preserve more genetic diversity and hope that the genetic results of a species will be more different. For a species like the cheetah, its genetic structure is already very small. But it is able to survive in the wild and currently has no symptoms. It means that this species is not declining due to inbreeding, so this is a very strange phenomenon. Generally speaking, it is believed that if a species is composed of highly inbred individuals, its ability to survive is very weak.

Domestication and breeding of cheetahs

Cheetahs are relatively easy to domesticate and raise. The earliest records of domestication in the world are Semitic people, who were the first to domesticate cheetahs. Marco Polo once noticed that he left some interesting records in his travel notes. He once noticed that even outside the cheetah's range, many Orientals kept cheetahs as pets. People think of cheetahs as hunting dogs, as monsters, or even as mounts. More than 3,000 years ago in ancient Egypt, Egyptian royals loved cats, especially cheetahs. They raise cheetahs to hunt for them, but the reproduction rate of cheetahs raised in captivity is generally low. For example, there once was a Mughal Empire in India. There was an emperor named Abak, who established a zoo with thousands of cheetahs. According to records at the time, only one cheetah successfully reproduced. Although cheetahs are easy to raise, people can train cheetahs to fetch things and hunt. But generally speaking, cheetahs are still relatively difficult animals to care for because they are so active. If there is another one, it is because it does not have a fixed nest. Therefore, people can only use cheetahs to hunt prey. Usually, hunters cover the cheetah's head and take it to a hunting location to save the cheetah's energy. Then after arriving at the location and finding the prey, immediately remove the cheetah's hood and let the cheetah hunt the prey. When a cheetah catches prey, the hunter usually lets the cheetah share a small portion of the prey, or lets it eat the blood of the prey.

The life of a cheetah

The life of a cheetah is relatively regular, usually working at sunrise and resting at sunset. It usually starts to look for food around five o'clock in the morning. It is more alert when walking, stopping from time to time to look around to see if there is any prey that can be eaten. On the other hand, it also prevents other beasts from preying on it. It usually rests at noon. When taking a nap, it gets up every 6 minutes to check to see if there are any dangers around it. Generally speaking, cheetahs only hunt one prey at a time, and the distance they walk every day is about five kilometers, and the maximum is more than ten kilometers. Although it is good at running, it does not travel very far. The cheetah is currently the fastest land animal in the world, with a speed of up to 112 kilometers per hour. If a human sprint world champion competes with a cheetah in a 100-meter race, the cheetah can let the world champion run 60 meters first, and it will be the cheetah that reaches the finish line, not the sprint world champion. Why does it run so fast? It is related to its body structure. One is that its legs are long and its body is very thin. Another cheetah's spine is very soft and easy to bend, like a big spring. When it runs, you can see that its forelimbs and hind limbs are exerting force, and its body is also rising and falling during running, so it runs very fast. When a cheetah is running, it needs to make sharp turns, and its big tail plays a balancing role. That is, when turning, the tail balances it so that it does not fall over. Because in nature, people give a vivid example, just like our human arms competition, if you run fast, I must run faster. Or if you want to catch me, I must escape, otherwise after I am eaten by you, I may wipe out the entire species. So the predator runs fast, and the prey must run faster, or there is some other way.

Generally speaking, because cheetahs run fast, other animals cannot run faster than them, so they have to try their best to do so. If you are like an antelope, it usually makes sharp turns and keeps turning sharply. Because if it runs in a straight line, it can't run. So it had to run a few steps and turn, so the cheetah had to keep turning. At this time, the cheetah needs to maintain balance. If it does not fall, it must rely on its big tail to maintain balance.

But it should be noted that since the cheetah runs so fast, it is a test for the respiratory and circulatory systems of its entire body. When its running speed reaches more than 110 kilometers, its respiratory and circulatory systems are overloaded. As we all know, when an animal's body moves, a large amount of heat is generated in its body. Animals must expel this heat, just like humans. Humans sweat a lot or pant when running. On the one hand, oxygen is inhaled, on the other hand, part of the heat is discharged through exhalation, and part of the heat is also discharged through perspiration. Because the cheetah cannot expel the accumulated heat at once and is prone to symptoms of collapse, so the cheetah can generally only sprint a few hundred meters before it slows down. Otherwise, its body will overheat and collapse will occur. So this kind of running is very debilitating. Sometimes the cheetah catches the prey because it ran too fast just now, so it can't eat at that time. It has to take a rest or catch its breath before it can start eating. This is the time when the cheetah is most vulnerable. It is very likely that its prey may be snatched away by nearby lions or leopards, and it may even be in danger of its own life. If the lions are too hungry, or if a group of lions has not eaten for a long time, then those lions may target cheetahs as their prey.

Cheetah's teeth

Cheetah's teeth are relatively sharp, but compared with other big cats, cheetah's teeth are smaller. This is what we mentioned earlier that the cheetah's head is relatively small. If the cheetah's head is relatively small, its upper jaw will be relatively small, so it cannot have very long tooth roots. In addition, its teeth cannot become very long. As we all know, if the teeth are very long, they need very long roots to prevent them from breaking easily. If the tooth root is short and the exposed part of the tooth is long, it is easy to break when biting something. Therefore, the cheetah's teeth are relatively small. Therefore, the entire cheetah's body structure seems to be designed for the characteristic of running fast. This is designed by the designer of nature. We call it competition for survival, because natural selection forces it to become like this, and it is designed to run faster. We say that a long time ago, 10,000 years ago, its ancestors were still very large, but those ancestors became extinct because they could not adapt to the environment. The remaining cheetahs are all very fast, and their body structures have also undergone great changes. Because it needs to consume a lot of oxygen when running, in order to absorb more oxygen, the cheetah has a large nasal cavity. So there isn't much space in its skull for tooth roots to grow, so its teeth are relatively short. If its teeth are short, as we all know, a carnivore relies on its claws and teeth to fight, so this affects its fighting ability.

In nature, cheetahs are often defeated by larger cats, such as lions, and may even be killed and eaten by lions. Because the cheetah's teeth are relatively short, the cheetah sometimes cannot use its teeth to bite food to death. It often clamps the prey's neck with its upper and lower jaws like pliers, causing the prey to suffocate to death. The cheetah's hunting method is generally like this: Although it runs fast, because the distance it runs is very limited, when it is hunting, it will try its best to get closer to the prey step by step. Trying not to let the prey discover it, when it gets close enough, it suddenly starts to jump out and pounce on the prey. At this time, it relies on speed to catch the prey. If it cannot catch it the first time, it is likely that the prey will not be caught. Because the prey runs very fast, like the antelope runs very fast. The other is to be good at avoiding it. If you keep making sharp turns, you may be able to avoid it. So when a cheetah catches an animal, it jumps out. If the animal is close, it stretches out its paws as much as possible. Therefore, its claws are always exposed, and the claws try to grab the hind limbs of the prey, hoping to catch it down. Then he pounces on it and bites its neck to subdue the prey. Generally speaking, those large prey will not die until the cheetah bites the neck of the prey for five to ten minutes. After the prey dies, the cheetah drags the carcasses of the prey to the middle of the jungle to eat.

Leopard and Cheetah

Speaking of cheetahs, we can compare them with leopards. Leopards and cheetahs are very similar. We can see that they are very similar in body shape and even from a distance they are indistinguishable. Leopards are different from cheetahs in that they like to climb trees to rest and sleep, or they may lie in wait among the branches to catch prey. Leopards often hunt at night. When leopards come down from the trees, they can pounce on their prey and rarely miss. Therefore, the leopards we usually see spend a lot of time in the trees, and are usually preyed on animals such as antelopes, so it is not easy to see them. It easily detects its prey and pounces upon it when it passes under a tree. When a leopard catches its prey, unlike the cheetah, it likes to drag the prey up a tree. It hides its prey among branches and eats it slowly to prevent hyenas or lions from snatching its food. In nature, even though a cheetah can run very fast, it often cannot catch an antelope or the animal it wants to prey on. Why is this? As we said before, although the cheetah can run fast, the distance it can run is very limited, which means it can only run a few hundred meters. The antelope is slower than the cheetah, but its speed is also very fast. It can run about 90 kilometers per hour. Therefore, once an antelope encounters a cheetah, it will run quickly and then turn. Another is to use hills, grass, or jungles as cover to run in a zigzag pattern. This prevents the cheetah from being able to use its ability to run fast, and then makes its predatory attempts in vain. This is the arms competition in nature. If the predator is fast, the prey must run faster. Either have stronger endurance than the prey, or use tricks to escape. Otherwise, some species in the world will become extinct. For the cheetah, because the antelope it eats has become extinct, its own survival will be in danger. Therefore, nature, the creator, will not easily cause a species to become extinct, so every species will have a chance to survive. You may have seen some very lively scenes that often occur on the African grasslands. Some large cats, like the leopards, lions, and cheetahs we see, will chase some of their prey, such as antelopes and wildebeests. This is actually a dynamic and dynamic process. Why? It is an integral part of nature's evolution, and part of it is that the weak, old, and even sick individuals are eaten by these beasts. Generally speaking, these preserved individuals are healthy and strong individuals. They may escape the predation of these beasts, so this is an organic link in the biological chain of nature. The social behavior of cheetahs is similar to that of other animals. It has a same-sex group. The so-called same-sex means that individuals of the same sex stay together. In wild cheetah groups, they are generally divided into groups of male individuals, that is, bachelor groups and female groups. There are also mother-child groups. Except for the breeding season, the male usually lives alone, or two or three male individuals stay together, and do not live with the female individuals. But the territories of these males may overlap with those of several groups of females, which stay with the males during the breeding season. Once the breeding season is over, the pregnant females form a separate group and wander in the wild. They hunt their own food, and when the time comes they give birth to young, and they move around with their young. Start breastfeeding and then move around together. Tell the cubs how to hunt. When the male cubs grow up, these male cheetah cubs will slowly leave the female group and start their own lives. Or several males stay together, and finally establish their own territory, and then carry out their own breeding period. This is their life cycle.

Similar to other animals, male cheetahs generally compete for mates. It's not that kind of monogamy, it's free competition in the wild. During the breeding season, male cheetahs will fight, and after a long fight, the winner will mate with the female cheetahs. Generally speaking, the mating time of cheetahs is relatively short. It is not as long as the mating time of lions and tigers. The mating time of cheetahs is relatively short. The gestation period of a female cheetah is 91 to 95 days. Generally speaking, a female cheetah can give birth to one to six cubs in one litter, usually two to four. Female cheetahs that give birth to cubs build their nests in areas with dense grass, deep in jungles, or in swamps, where other animals cannot reach.

Because it is possible that some ferocious beasts may prey on these cheetah cubs. Generally, cheetah cubs will not start to hunt independently until they are 1 year old. The weight of a cheetah cub is generally 240 to 300 grams. It takes two to three days after birth before it can crawl, four to fourteen days before its eyes open, and twenty-one to twenty-eight days before it begins to feed. Two Weaning begins after 1 month. When a cheetah cub is born, it has some cloak-like hair on its back. The fluffy hair starts to fall off when it is two and a half months old. After nine to ten months, the female cheetah begins to reach sexual maturity. It usually takes a male cheetah fourteen months to reach sexual maturity, so in the first few months after the cheetah cubs are born, the female cheetah usually hides the cheetah cubs in the grass. Cheetahs are not weaned until three months later. At this time, the weaned cheetah still follows its mother. At this time, it learns hunting, life, and the skills to escape from natural enemies from its mother. It is not until 1 to 1 and a half years old that a cheetah cub begins to live independently. Generally, male cheetahs begin to live independently. Female cheetahs may still stay with their mother. Female cheetahs set their territory on the migration routes of the antelopes and wildebeests that they often prey on. Sometimes when a female cheetah is pregnant, she still runs very fast and is very flexible in hunting. It also has to catch food, so there are certain limits on the individual weight of its offspring and the number of gestations it can carry. Because during pregnancy, even in the late stages of pregnancy, it must be able to catch food. Otherwise, it would not be possible to complete the pregnancy process.

The strange thing is that female cheetahs, especially those who have given birth to cheetah cubs, have a hunting success rate that is twice as high as that of lions and leopards. At that time, it will be very easy to catch antelope or wildebeest. When a female cheetah hunts, no matter how tired she is, she always drags her prey to a safe and hidden place. Why? Because there are many cheetah cubs waiting to eat, it cannot let this food be snatched away by other hyenas, lions, and leopards. Otherwise, its cubs and itself are in danger of starvation.

As I said just now, the number of cheetahs in Africa ranges from 9,000 to 12,000, and about 10% of them live in captivity. But more than forty years ago, in 1960, the number of cheetahs was more than double the number of cheetahs now. This means that the cheetah is now on the verge of extinction, its distribution area is shrinking, and its number is declining. Therefore, protecting cheetahs has become a task for people, especially in Africa. It is a very important task. So one of the reasons for the decrease in the number of cheetahs is the decrease in herbivores. Like antelopes and wildebeests, their numbers have decreased, and their distribution areas have decreased, so the food resources of cheetahs have decreased. Another point is that the cheetah's ecological environment has been divided and isolated by human villages, roads and other human activity areas. At this time, the cheetah group is very small, which means it is very difficult for cheetahs to find a mate. The third reason is due to the trade of cheetah skins, especially international trade. As we all know, the cheetah's skin is a bit like tiger skin, with some black stripes and spots on the yellow background, so it looks good. Therefore, it is also an object of trade. That is, people want, especially wealthy people, to buy cheetah skins to decorate places like their living rooms. Now due to the implementation of CITES, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, this trade is restricted. But this kind of smuggling still exists, and the poaching of cheetahs by these smugglers is also a great threat to the survival of cheetahs.

Current protection of cheetahs

At present, we generally take the following measures to protect cheetahs: One is to establish national parks and nature reserves. There are many large national parks in Africa. In places like Serengo Land, a large national park has been established in Masai Mara. The park is very large and contains a relatively large population of cheetahs. In addition, some nature reserves have been established, and cheetahs also live in these reserves. Secondly, people began to breed cheetahs in captivity. In addition, cheetahs are also bred in some wildlife parks. You can also see cheetahs in our wildlife parks in China, and they all breed offspring. They can also breed in places far away from home. The third point is that the international trade of cheetah skins has been banned, which has greatly reduced the hunting of cheetahs. Because without normal trade channels, ordinary legal merchants would no longer carry out this kind of trade.

Well, this is the story about the cheetah

The cheetah is not good at climbing because its claws are on the outside, so it generally cannot climb up trees. At most, it can climb up some fallen logs. So in Africa, sometimes we see some cats, like cheetahs. If they are resting in a tree or waiting for prey, they think they are cheetahs. In fact, they are not, they are leopards. An American scientist named Stephen has studied the population structure of many wild animals. He found that the cheetahs in the world today are all closely related individuals. In other words, these cheetahs are the offspring of closely related individuals and inbreeding. Because they are the offspring of inbreeding, their individual genetic structures are very similar, that is, their genetic makeup is very similar, at least like twins. There is a related issue here. Generally speaking, people particularly hope to preserve more genetic diversity and hope that the genetic results of a species will be more different. For a species like the cheetah, its genetic structure is already very small. But it is able to survive in the wild and currently has no symptoms. It means that this species is not declining due to inbreeding, so this is a very strange phenomenon. Generally speaking, it is believed that if a species is composed of highly inbred individuals, its ability to survive is very weak.

So the cheetah is a protected animal in our country!