Leopardus species have spotted
fur, with ground colors ranging from pale
buff,
ochre,
fulvous and
tawny to light gray.[5] Their small
ears are rounded and white-spotted; their
rhinarium is prominent and naked above, and their
nostrils are widely separated.[6] They have 36
chromosomes, whereas other felids have 38.[7]
Taxonomy
The
generic nameLeopardus was proposed by
John Edward Gray in 1842, when he described two spotted cat skins from Central America and two from
India in the collection of the
Natural History Museum, London.[8]
Several genera were proposed in the 19th and early 20th centuries for small spotted cats in the Americas, including:
Dendrailurus, Lynchailurus, Noctifelis, Oncifelis and Oncoïdes by
Nikolai Severtzov in 1858;[9]
Margay, Pajeros, Pardalina and Pardalis by Gray in 1867;[10]
Analysis of skull
morphology of these
taxa revealed close similarities in their
base of skulls and
nasal bones, their
masticatory muscles, and dentition.[14]Phylogenetic analysis of tissue samples of these taxa and their ability to
hybridise support the notion that they are members of the same genus.[4][7]
The following eight extant Leopardus species have commonly been recognized as
valid taxa since 2017:[3]
Additionally, more recent genetic analyses in 2017 and 2021 proposed the recognition of a third tigrina-like species, Leopardus emiliae.[30][31]
A 2021 analysis of 142 pampas cat museum specimen collected across South America showed significant morphological differences between them. Therefore, it was proposed to split the historically-contentious pampas cat
species complex into five species: Leopardus colocolo, Leopardus braccatus, Leopardus garleppi, Leopardus munoai, and Leopardus pajeros.[32] Later that same year, it was noted that the oldest available name for pampas cats of the Uruguayan savannah region was Leopardus fasciatus, not L. munoai.[33]
Another study in 2023 described another new species, Leopardus narinensis, based on a single dried skin collected in 1989 on the
Galeras Volcano in the Nariño Department of Colombia. They found it to be very different from all other Leopardus species both morphologically and genetically.[34]
A different study in 2024 did a detailed analysis of both the morphology and genetics of specimens assigned to Leopardus tigrinus, Leopardus guttulus, and Leopardus emiliae. It suggested L. t. pardinoides should be elevated to species status as Leopardus pardinoides due to significant differences in morphology, genetics, and ecology. The study also assigned the subspecies L. t. oncilla to be a subspecies of L. pardinoides as L. p. oncilla. Additionally, genetic analysis suggested that Leopardus emiliae was not genetically distinct from L. tigrinus, and thus may be invalid. The study recommended the common names savannah tiger-cat for L. tigrinus, Atlantic Forest tiger-cat for L. guttulus, and clouded tiger-cat for L. pardinoides.[35]
An expanded list of Leopardus species would be:[36]
Leopardus braccatus, the
Pantanal cat or Brazilian pampas cat
Leopardus colocola, the colocolo or Central Chilean pampas cat
Leopardus emiliae, the eastern tigrina or Snethlage's tigrina
Leopardus fasciatus, Muñoa’s pampas cat or Uruguayan pampas cat
Leopardus garleppi, the northern pampas cat or Garlepp's pampas cat
Leopardus geoffroyi, Geoffroy's cat
Leopardus guigna, the kodkod
Leopardus guttulus, the southern tigrina or Atlantic Forest tiger-cat
Leopardus jacobita, the Andean mountain cat
Leopardus narinensis, the Nariño cat, Galeras cat, or red tigrina[34]
Leopardus pajeros, the southern pampas cat
Leopardus pardalis, the ocelot
Leopardus pardinoides, the clouded tiger-cat
Leopardus tigrinus, the oncilla, northern tigrina, or savannah tiger-cat
Within the genus, three distinct
clades were identified: one comprising the ocelot and the margay, a second the Andean mountain cat and Pampas cat, and the third the kodkod, oncilla and Geoffroy's cat.[38][39] The following
cladogram shows estimated
divergence times in million years ago (mya).
Phylogenetic relationships of living Leopardus species as derived through analysis of
^
abBerta, A. (1983). "A new species of small cat (Felidae) from the late Pliocene – early Pleistocene (Uquian) of Argentina". Journal of Mammalogy. 64 (4): 720–725.
doi:
10.2307/1380541.
JSTOR1380541.
^
abKitchener, A. C.; Breitenmoser-Würsten, C.; Eizirik, E.; Gentry, A.; Werdelin, L.; Wilting, A.; Yamaguchi, N.; Abramov, A. V.; Christiansen, P.; Driscoll, C.; Duckworth, J. W.; Johnson, W.; Luo, S.-J.; Meijaard, E.; O’Donoghue, P.; Sanderson, J.; Seymour, K.; Bruford, M.; Groves, C.; Hoffmann, M.; Nowell, K.; Timmons, Z.; Tobe, S. (2017).
"A revised taxonomy of the Felidae: The final report of the Cat Classification Task Force of the IUCN Cat Specialist Group"(PDF). Cat News (Special Issue 11): 46–58.
^Allen J. A. (1919). "Notes on the synonymy and nomenclature of the smaller spotted cats of tropical America". Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History. 41: 341–419.
^Pocock, R.I. (1941). "The Examples of the Colocolo and of the Pampas Cat in the British Museum". The Annals and Magazine of Natural History. 7 (39): 257–274.
doi:
10.1080/03745481.1941.9727931.
^Linnaeus, C. (1758).
"Felis pardalis". Systema naturae per regna tria naturae: secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis. Vol. I (Tenth ed.). Holmiae: Laurentius Salvius. p. 42.
^Paviolo, A.; Crawshaw, P.; Caso, A.; de Oliveira, T.; Lopez-Gonzalez, C.A.; Kelly, M.; De Angelo, C. & Payan, E. (2016) [errata version of 2015 assessment].
"Leopardus pardalis". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 2015: e.T11509A97212355.
^Schreber, J. C. D. (1778).
"Die Maragua". Die Säugethiere in Abbildungen nach der Natur, mit Beschreibungen. Erlangen: Wolfgang Walther. pp. 396–397.
^
abMolina, G. I. (1782).
"La Guigna Felis guigna". Saggio sulla storia naturale del Chilli. Bologna: Stamperia di S. Tommaso d’Aquino. p. 295. Archived from
the original on 2019-06-08. Retrieved 2019-03-25.
^Schinz, H. R. (1821).
"Wiedische Katze Felis wiedii". Das Thierreich eingetheilt nach dem Bau der Thiere: als Grundlage ihrer Naturgeschichte und der vergleichenden Anatomie von dem Herrn Ritter von Cuvier. Säugethiere und Vögel, Volume 1. Stuttgart, Tübingen: Cotta. pp. 235–236.