Chinese Desert/Mountain Cat (Felis bieti) in Sichuan
Michel Watelet from Belgium just wrote to say he’s back from a great trip in Sichuan with 3 friends (trip report to follow) and he saw a Chinese Mountain Cat.
“I found the cat on 04 June 2013 in North Sichuan ( Coordonnées : N33 35.211 E103 08.793 ). The altitude was 3500 m. It was late afternoon around 20 h. Desciption : Pelage was “Sand grey” rather uniform, with some stripes on head and legs. It was stout with a big rounded head, the nose was flat with a withe zone below. Ears was clearly tufts. The tail was big with 3 or 4 black ring a the end, the tip was black.”
Look forward to the trip report.
Jon
7 Comments
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Vladimir Dinets
Congratulations! It might be the first photo ever taken in the wild. I would recommend publishing it in IUCN’s journal Cat News.
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Jeroen verhoeff
I think I know of at least 3 different photographs of seemingly two individuals that seemed to have been taken in the wild. I have them if anyone is interested.
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PandaSmith
I saw one of these the last time I was in Ke Ke Xi Li. I tried so hard to pursue it and photograph it but at 4800 I barely made it 25 meters before pooping out up the hill…. 😉 GREAT picture!
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vnsankar
Seems like VENT birding tours saw one on their 2011 trip to Sichuan in the same region (Rueorgai). Take a look at this: http://www.ventbird.com/news/2011/08/22/classic-china-beijing-sichuan.
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Jeroen verhoeff
Isn’t it felis silvestris bieti? I thought it was now officially concidered a subspecies of wildcat. Still pretty cool though!