American spotted cats
Leopardus Gray, 1842
Leopardus is a genus of small cats native to the Americas. This genus is considered the oldest branch of a genetic lineage of small cats in the Americas whose common ancestor crossed the Bering land bridge from Asia to North America in the late Miocene.
- Also published as
- Oncifelis Severtzov, 1858; Oreailurus Cabrera, 1940
16 species · 16 branches
- Leopardus braccatusspecies
- Leopardus colocolaspecies
- Leopardus emiliaespecies
- Leopardus garleppispecies
- Leopardus geoffroyispecies
- Leopardus guignaspecies
- Leopardus guttulusspecies
- Leopardus jacobitusspecies
- Leopardus munoaispecies
- Leopardus narinensisspecies
- Leopardus pajerosspecies
- Leopardus pardalisspecies
- Leopardus pardinoidesspecies
- Leopardus tigrinusspecies
- Leopardus tilcayospecies
- Leopardus wiediispecies
From Wikipedia (CC BY-SA), quoted section by section
Description
Leopardus species have spotted fur, with ground colors ranging from pale buff, ochre, fulvous and tawny to light gray. Their small ears are rounded and white-spotted; their rhinarium is prominent and naked above, and their nostrils are widely separated. They have 36 chromosomes, whereas other felids have 38.
Where it has been recorded
Recorded sightings
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geo-referenced records in GBIF, from museums, herbaria and field observers.
Drag the globe to turn it. Dots are where records exist, not a range map; darker means more records.
In the stacks
Searching the stacks…
Every page naming Leopardus in the Biodiversity Heritage Library →
References
- Wilson, Don E., and DeeAnn M. Reeder, eds. (1993). Mammal Species of the World: A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference, 2nd Ed., 3rd Printing.
- Sunquist, M. E. and F. C. Sunquist / Don E. Wilson and Russell A. Mittermeier, eds. (2009). Family Felidae (Cats). Handbook of the Mammals of the World. Vol. 1: Carnivores.
- Kitchener, A. C., C. Breitenmoser-Würsten, E. Eizirik, A. Gentry, L. Werdelin, A. Wilting, et al. (2017). A revised taxonomy of the Felidae. The final report of the Cat Classification Task Force of the IUCN/SSC Cat Specialist Group. Cat News Special Issue, Vol. 11.
- Wilson, Don E., and DeeAnn M. Reeder, eds. (2005). Mammal Species of the World: A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference, 3rd Ed., Vols. 1 & 2.
- Lescroart, Jonas, Paola Nogales-Ascarrunz, Molly Cassatt-Johnstone, A. Bonilla-Sánchez, et al. (2026). Phylogenomics and museomics reveal five distinct species of tiger cats in South America. Current Biology, Vol. 36.
From the Catalogue of Life (catalogueoflife.org), compiled from its specialist databases; CC BY 4.0. This name in the Catalogue of Life.