Jaguar Features

The presence of jaguars in an area is an indicator of ecosystem health, because it means that the populations of their prey, peccaries, tapirs, deer, armadillos, are fine. And if these herbivores are in good condition, the vegetation too.
The skin is reddish yellow, except inside the ears, in the bottom of the mouth, jaws, throat and other lower parts of the body, where the color is paler, in the bottom of the legs predominantly white. It also has black spots characteristics, type rosettes, round, elongated or irregular lines that branch on the cross and come back together in the back, forming the sides more or less parallel lines, smaller head, neck and legs than in the rest of the body. The tail has rings on her haunches. No two jaguars in the same pattern of spots.
Are similar to the leopard of Asia and Africa, but the jaguar is more robust, has larger head and shorter tail. Moreover, while the jaguar is a good climber, it spends so much time on trees, their fur is also more orange and has the largest rosettes leopard. Men do not attack like leopards, they do have records of attacks on man.
The weight of an adult jaguar is 45 to 130 kg depending on the subspecies, can weigh 150 kg. Females are between 10 and 20 percent smaller than males.
Its length is 1.70 to 2.30 m and a height to the cross of about 85. Its tail is between 45 and 75 cm.
Life expectancy of a jaguar in captivity is 22 years. In the wilderness is probably 10 years, except in rare cases can reach up to 20 years.
In contrast to the other big cats, the jaguar growls but rarely roars.
Has nocturnal, although it has some activity during the day. Through radio-tracking studies have been known to often be active 50 to 60% of the day (counting the 24 hours, according to another camera trapping study in Bolivia can be active at any time of day, with peaks from dawn until mid- morning in both seasons (5:00 - 10:00 am) and evening (20:00 - 0:00 pm) more pronounced in the rainy season.
The acuteness of his senses of smell and hearing and their ability to run, climb trees, swim and move crouched behind a dam makes it an excellent hunter.
Being accustomed to jungle biomes in low light (though its range came to encompass meadows and steppes), has nyctalops eyes, allowing a remarkable vision in the dark, thanks to a reflective membrane at the back of the eye that focuses light in the focal area of ​​the retina. (This is the reason why when you focus on with a light to a cat at night, their eyes seem to light up, because they reflect too much light).
Moreover, unlike other cats are excellent swimmers and are also adapted to hunt aquatic prey from the surface and underwater, in these cases, the vibrations of the fish, alligators and turtles they come clearly through his legs and whiskers.
His nose is well developed and can detect prey by smell quite a distance, in such cases open your mouth better facilitating arrival of odorant molecules to olfactory organs.
The size and defending their territory varies depending on food availability and reproduction lasoportunidades. During the day, the males often travel about 3.3 km and 1.8 km females into their territories. Both sexes tend to move greater distances during the dry season, possibly because of increased scarcity of food.
Males have larger territories than females, and although these territories do not overlap with other males, if they can do with the territories of several adult females. The delimitation of the territory, marking made by urine, droppings or other signs, such as scratches on trees or vocalizations. If necessary to defend the territory, they can direct confrontation.
The territories of males reach extensions up to 380 km2, while females occupy territories of up to 134 km2 on average. When the habitat is optimal and jaguars density is high, males occupy small territories of about 30 to 50 km2, while a female between 15 and 25 km2
Females reach sexual maturity between two and two and a half years, while males three to four years. The last play is usually at age 8.
Although most of the year for the jaguar is a solitary animal, the breeding season arrival will seek a partner, the time plot in the tropics is not limited to any particular season of the year, although in some geographic areas can be found the breeding season associated with any climatic period specified. This occurs in areas where hydro stations are very marked and can influence the availability of prey. For example, Leopold (1959) mentioned that in Mexico of births occur between July and September, but they vary geographically.
Then spend 4 or 5 weeks with the chosen partner. During heat female behavior change. His appetite does not decrease, but groans, rubs against objects and rolls on the floor frequently. During mating, the female is loud, while the male does not.
After a gestation period of about 93 to 110 days (about 100 days on average), the female selects a sheltered place to give birth to their young. Birth usually occurs during the rainy season when lots of food and between impenetrable thickets of the forest.
Choose places like caves, hollows between the roots of trees, bushes or rocks, on slopes that originate on the banks of rivers.

Have from 1 to 4 cubs, who was born blind and weigh between 700 grams and 900 grams. Puppies are born with a long coat, woolly and pale, with a mottled pattern of black spots with pale color in the center, curiously in the face that black stripe. Take final adult coloration at 7 months. After 2 weeks they open their eyes.
jaguar breeding females have full responsibility for the care of offspring. At first the mother and her offspring live in a burrow in the ground or a tree and, in cases of danger, moved the fry in his mouth. After 6 or eight weeks, the young with their mothers during their excursions. From 3 to 6 months stop nursing and two years to live and hunt with his mother. From then become independent of the mother and begin the process of scattering and search for their own territory. This scattering process coincides with the zeal of the mother.