Animal Profile: Amur Leopard

To kick off the new year Little Critterz is celebrating the diversity of our wonderful planet by spotlighting a different animal every week! So to start off 2014, we begin with the majestic Amur Leopard of northeastern Asia.

Found in the Primorye region of Russia, the Amur Leopard is the only leopard subspecies that has adapted to a frigid, snowy climate. Like many big cats, the Amur Leopard is an exemplary example of an animal built for hunting. This ferocious feline is known to run at speeds up to 40 miles per hour and can jump ten feet in the air in an effort to capture its prey!

These leopards are characterized as an extremely solitary creature and are known to be very protective of their chosen territory. It is not uncommon for a single Amur Leopard to have a territory of over 100 square miles! Unfortunately though, in the past couple decades, these leopards have lost an estimated 80% of their native territories through harmful activities such as logging and land conservation for farming.

Currently, there are only around 30 Amur Leopards left in the wild. Recently, habitat assessment and anti-poaching measures have been put in place by the Russian Government to help preserve this beautiful animal. While the current situation seems bleak, the recent preservation focus on the Amur Leopard provides new found optimism for the future of this species!

Our goal at Little Critterz is to spread the respect of animals through education of and interaction with animals. We believe this to be done by learning about the wondrous world of animals both online and in person at zoos, national parks and aquariums. We also believe respect, thus protection for animals, stems through admiration of animal, real and treasured symbols, like this Amur Leopard miniature porcelain figurine.

Preserving Burma's Forests

While much of the natural world is compromised by the rapid spread of industrialization, there remains at least one largely unaffected region the destructive hands of the new age have not touched. Burma, also known as Myanmar, is a country teeming with undiscovered wildlife and species not seen anywhere else in the world.

For the last fifty years Burma has been under rigid military rule with extremely strict regulations prohibiting almost all foreigners from visiting the country. Recently, however, the country has gradually shifted towards democracy and the government has loosened the statutes on foreigners entering the country. Taking this opportunity of increasingly lax regulations, BBC recently sent a group of scientists and anthropologists to journey deep into the vast Burmese forests as a part of the fantastic new documentary series Wild Burma: Nature's Lost Kingdom. We are thrilled at the chance to view the amazing landscape and wildlife for the first time.

The expedition has unearthed a multitude of rare and undiscovered animals. Asian elephants, clouded leopards, Malayan tapirs, sun bears and various unknown insects are among the species found.

    Unknown Tortoise Leaf Beetle

    Clouded Leopard

   Sun Bear

    Malayan Tapir

    Asian Elephants

As Burma becomes more accessible to the outside world, it is imperative that the natural order of the massive forests and jungles are intact. The overarching goal of the BBC crew is to present their research to the Burmese government in order to gain the area well-funded protection. Burma has a choice, as it embarks into a new era of openness, of whether it wants to embrace the destructive practices of the contemporary world or help preserve one of Earth's one last remnants of what use to be.

Watch the first episode of Wild Burma: Nature's Lost Kingdom here.

New Little Critterz for Fall!

We add new Little Critterz to our collection this fall! We are constantly inspired by the environment, changes, and settings of our world as well as by our customer's likes and interests. For the fall we're introducing two new lines of Little Critterz, plus several animals to existing lines!

Serendipity Critterz
We've recently partnered with award winning children's author Stephen Cosgrove to create a collection based on his Serendipity book, the Serendipity Critterz. They include Leo the Lop, Sniffles, Creole and more! Read more about the new line, and Stephen Cosgrove here.

Glow in the Dark Critterz
This is such a fun line that glows in the dark! Perfect as night lights to help the kids get over their fear of the dark. Keep them in the sun all day and they'll shine all night! The line includes dragons, fairies, mermaids, and more!

 

New Animals

Leopard is such a cool fall trend - faux of course! The mixes of browns and blacks creates a neutral backdrop allowing for coordinating colors to pop. Plus it's fierce and fun!

We've created a leopard Little Critterz to jazz up your space! Plus, an adorable chinchilla, lobster, antelope, and much more!

Check them out on our website to get your new miniature porcelain figurine!

-the Little Critterz team

The Lion Whisperer

Okay, this guy is cool. His name is Kevin Richardson and his nickname is The Lion Whisperer. Why you ask? A self taught animal behaviorist, Kevin has spent his entire life caring for animals and the better part of his adult life breaking every safety rule in the book building relationships with natural born predators. Not believing in traditional methods of breaking an animal's spirit with sticks and chains, but instead using love, understanding and trust to develop personal bonds and getting to know their personalities, what makes them happy or irritated.

Kevin runs The Kingdom Wildlife Sanctuary for lions, hyenas, leopards and antelope in South Africa. The sanctuary is made up of a number of natural enclosures where the animals rotate to keep them stimulated and enriched. He is apart of the PAW Protecting African Wildlife Conservation Trust and is passionate about stopping the legal slaughter of 1000 lions annual for sport.

You can watch Kevin on his show on the National Geographic Channel called The Lion Ranger, or his feature film or numerous documentaries. Volunteer options are available - talk about an experience!

10 Most Endangered Animals

10. The little dodo bird, an island ground pigeon. Native to Samoa, and only twelve inches in length, it's relative is the famous large dodo bird from Mauritius which became extinct 400 years ago. They are disappearing at an alarming rate due to habitat loss and illegal hunting. Survey suggests less than 200 dodo birds exist. Worse still, there are no dodo birds in captivity.

9. The Chinese giant salamander, native to central, southwestern and southern China, is the world's largest amphibian (reaching up to 6 feet!). Although it can lay up to 500 eggs at a time, then guarded by the males, they have almost completely disappeared due to over-exploitation as a food source.

8. The Siberian (Amur) Tiger, the largest big cat in the world, living in negative 50 degree climates of Russia. Due to hunting, the Siberian saw a decline to just 40 tigers in the 1930s, now population estimates are around 500. Read our post about the tiger here.

7. Leatherback Sea Turtle, despite having the largest regions of habitats (spreading from tropics to subpolar regions), population has plummeted from over 100,000 female Leatherback Sea Turtles to just 30,000 14 years later, and the number continues to fall at alarming rates. The biggest threats to these turtles is ingesting plastic bags, which they confuse as food like jellyfish, humans stealing their eggs, illegal hunting, beach development, and beach erosions due to climate change.

6. Western Lowland Gorilla and Cross River Gorilla, both native to West Africa. Although the Western Lowland Gorilla is much more numerous than the Cross River, they have seen a 60% population decline in the last 25 years. Threats include habitat loss, illegal commercial hunting by poachers and the ebola virus.

5. Northern Right Whale was named for it being the right whale to kill as it was full of valuable whale oil but it also floats when it's dead, making it easy to handle and process. As a result, it was driven to near extinction. Entanglements in commercial fishing, and climate change affecting crustaceans on which the whales feed threatens the existence of the Northern Right Whale.

4. Northern Sportive Lemur, or any of the other 100 species of lemurs. All species live on the island of Madagascar and are declining drastically in population due to illegal hunting and habitat deforestation from logging. Researchers have recently reportered there may only be 20 wild Northern Sportive Lemurs. Less than 100 Greater Bamboo Lemurs exist in the wild.

3. Javan Rhinoceros is the most threatened of the 5 rhino species. Between 40-60 remain in the Ujung Kulon National Park and the last of a small group in Vietnam was killed by poachers. The Javan Rhinoceros has been hunted to near extinction for it's horns.

2. Amur Leopard which lives in snowy Russia, a rare breed adapted to this climate. Similar to the African leopard, the Amur can run at speeds up to 37 miles per hour (60 km/hour). Only 30 Amur Leopards remain in the wild. The threats, habitat loss due to logging, roads and civilizations, illegal hunting and climate change.

1. Ivory-Billed Woodpecker which lives, or lived in southeastern US and Cuba. It was listed as extinct in 2004, but few reports of sightings have been made in Florida and Arkansas. Extinction has been caused by habitat deforestation (logging) and human exploitation for it's feathers.