Acinonyx jubatus ssp. venaticus
| Kingdom |
Phylum |
Class |
Order |
Family |
| ANIMALIA |
CHORDATA |
MAMMALIA |
CARNIVORA |
FELIDAE |
| Scientific Name: |
Acinonyx jubatus ssp. venaticus |
| Infra-specific Authority: |
(Griffith, 1821) |
Common Name/s:
| English |
– |
Asiatic Cheetah, Iranian Cheetah |
|
| Synonym/s: |
Acinonyx jubatus (Hilzheimer, 1913) ssp. raddei
|
| Taxonomic Notes: |
The subspecies A. j. venaticus, commonly called the Asiatic Cheetah, is considered by Nowell and Jackson (1996) to survive only in Iran. They place the eastern limit of its range in Arabia. However, the review by Krausman and Morales (2005) included cheetahs from the northern Sahara in venaticus. The type locality of A. j. venaticus (=Felis venatica [Griffith, 1821]) is unknown (Krausman and Morales 2005). At a November 2006 meeting of the North African Region Cheetah Action Group (NARCAG), Belchabir (2007) recommended genetic studies to clarify whether the cheetahs of Algeria (which probably has the largest Saharan cheetah population) should be classified as A. j. hecki or A. j. venaticus. Presently A. j. venaticus is considered restricted to Asia. |
Assessment Information
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| Red List Category & Criteria: |
Critically Endangered
D
ver 3.1
|
| Year Assessed: |
2008 |
| Assessor/s |
Jowkar, H., Hunter, L., Ziaie, H., Marker, L., Breitenmoser-Wursten, C. & Durant, S. |
| Evaluator/s: |
Nowell, K., Breitenmoser-Wursten, C., Breitenmoser, U. (Cat Red List Authority) & Hoffmann, M. (Global Mammal Assessment Team) |
Justification:
With a historic distribution across southwest and central Asia to India (Nowell and Jackson 1996, Mallon 2007), the Asiatic Cheetah is now only known to occur with certainty in Iran. The population is very small. For the Red List, population is defined as the number of “mature individuals known or inferred to be capable of reproduction.” This was interpreted for cats as the effective population size, or number of animals estimated to be passing on their genes through successful raising and recruitment of offspring (Nowell et al., 2007). Effective population size for cheetahs (females in Tanzania's Serengeti National Park) was estimated at 44% of the census population (incorporating variability in lifetime reproductive success: Kelly 2001). The census population of cheetahs in Iran is estimated at 60-100 (Hunter et al., 2007), with less than half likely to consist of mature breeding individuals.
Although the population currently appears stable (Hunter et al. 2007), it has declined in recent decades. There were said to be over 200 Cheetahs in Iran in the mid-1970s (E. Ferouz, pers. comm. 1974), although some experts consider this figure an over-estimate (P. Joslin, pers. comm.) (Nowell and Jackson 1996).
|
| History: |
| 1996 |
– |
Critically Endangered
(Baillie and Groombridge 1996)
|
| 1996 |
– |
Critically Endangered
(Baillie and Groombridge 1996)
|
| 1994 |
– |
Endangered
(IUCN)
|
| 1990 |
– |
Endangered
(IUCN 1990)
|
| 1988 |
– |
Endangered
|
| 1986 |
– |
Endangered
(IUCN Conservation Monitoring Centre 1986)
|
|
Geographic Range
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| Range Map: |
(click map to view full version)
|
Population
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| Population Trend: |
Stable
|
Habitat and Ecology
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