ARIZONA, USA — There's a new cat in town, and they're a little smaller than the jaguars you hear about from time to time.
Scientists with the Phoenix Zoo and the Arizona Center for Nature Conservation (ACNC) recently captured video of the first ocelot to be seen in the Atascosa Highlands in 50 years.
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Back in April, the team of researchers set out field cameras in the Coronado National Forest’s Nogales Ranger District to try and document the passage of wildlife through the area. Come June, they got the little wildcat on camera!
"AZGFD has conducted a pelage spot analysis comparing this ocelot with the current known ocelot in the state, as well as previous ocelots and concludes that this is indeed a new ocelot," the zoo said in a press release.
It's not uncommon for ocelots to get mistaken for miniature jaguars, but these spotted wild cats are a separate species of leopard entirely. They're native to the southwestern United States, Mexico, many parts of Central and South America and several Caribbean islands.
The region, which includes the Atascosa, Tumacácori, and Pajarito mountains is a known wildlife corridor but has gone relatively unstudied. When the zoo's Field Conservation Research team did their initial study in 2023, they recorded 21 different species of mammals but no ocelots or jaguars.
So even if this cat is tiny, it's a big deal!
"Finding evidence of a new ocelot in southern Arizona reinforces our commitment to collaborative efforts to conserve wildlife and their habitats in the region," said ACNC/Phoenix Zoo President and CEO Bert Castro. "We’re eager to review additional camera data from this study to see what else we can learn about species of conservation concern in the borderlands and what they need for their continued survival."
Researchers will be returning to the region later in August and again in October to collect more data from the cameras, samples from the environment, and we're hoping more pictures of our new furry friend.
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