How do fires start in Pantanal and why do they spread uncontrollably?
The fires started when farmers burned forest to create space for cattle ranches, but the fires spread uncontrollably due to drought.
These big cats are already extinct in two countries, where?
El Salvador and Uruguay.
The last jaguar that lived in the United States was killed by hunters in 1993. True of false?
False. 1963.
In 2019, farmers in Brazil burned seven million acres of the Amazon rainforest to clear space for two activities: what were these?
Cattle farming and soybean fields.
What is population fragmentation?
Population fragmentation happens when groups of jaguars are separated from each other and cannot mate.
Ganesh Marin, a student at the University of Arizona, caught a jaguar on camera in Mexico, just two miles south of Arizona. Marin named this spotted cat:
El Bonito or The Beautiful
What is the relation between jaguars and the growth of plants?
Jaguars eat armadillos, armadillos eat earthworms which are responsible to maintain the soil, allowing plants to grow and flourish.
What is the home to the second-largest jaguar population in the world?
Brazil's Pantanal.
What is the "jaguar corridor"?
A passageway for jaguars across 18 Latin American countries.
They are not picky eaters. Their ultrastrong bite that can break through:
Tough crocodile skin, animal bones, and turtle shells.
Today, jaguars are found mainly in:
Brazil’s Amazon rainforest.
Jaguars are called "...." predators.
Apex predators, or the animals at the top of the food chain.
Why did poachers and ranchers kill jaguars?
Poachers hunted jaguars for their spotted pelts, and ranchers killed jaguars to protect their cows and livestock.
Jaguars are the only big cats that live in Americas.
True.
Why do jaguars start to hunt livestock?
A jaguar requires up to 100 square miles of land to hunt, prey, and mate. With less land and fewer prey, they hunt livestock.
According to the text, what is deforestation?
People remove forest trees to build towns, roads, and farms for food production. This purposeful burning or cutting down of trees is called deforestation.
A primary threat to jaguars is...?
The destruction of their habitat.
The other jaguar that traveled from a preserve in Mexico was called:
El Jefe or The Boss
What is a consequence of population fragmentation?
Reproducing babies is far more challenging for jaguars.