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It's Leopardus tilcayo aka 'tilcayo tiger cat' and it's very cute. Wikipedia doesn't have a page dedicated to it yet.
Bonus pics: https://www.newscientist.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/SEI_...
https://media.zenfs.com/en/live_science_953/73a4cafd69e9e863...
https://media.zenfs.com/en/live_science_953/1fea354ba7a8db69...
https://thepeninsulaqatar.com/get/maximage/20260917_17896627...
Looks like a house cat, I am betting it's a matter of months before someone starts selling the crossbreds, like they do with Bengal.
Also, they're only 3-4 lbs!
All the wildcats (which basically include domestic cats) are very closely related based on my understanding. Even the whole box thing is related to a lot of wildcats having a liking for caves.
even as a kid we all liked little forts and boxes etc, which is itself interesting. snow caves were awesome; makes me wonder if it's a primeval instinct somehow.
All of a cat's senses and weapons face forward. It makes purfect sense to have its back protected from an attack from behind.
Let's see if it (or crossbreeds) can be tamed.
This particular one was actually being kept in a house because someone confused it for a "pretty housecat". After a while, the owner realized it didn't want to be tamed and contacted someone for help.
Also, it's the only known one in existence. Hard to start a breeding program unless they find more.
Clearly you are not a cat person ... the question is not if it can be tamed, but how quickly it can tame the humans around it ... ;-)
I mean, taming animals is trivial. Look at the lion whisperer. People before that thought that lions are always wild.
Some animals are just harder to tame and remain ferocious more than others. But behaviour of animals is adaptable and most animals learn.
I mean, taming animals is trivial.
FTFA: "The man took the animal home, believing it to be a domestic breed. But after about a year of living with the clearly wild animal, he realized it would be better off at a sanctuary."
I think the lady that got mauled to death in 2018 at the lion preserve that guy works at might disagree with you if she hadn’t been y’know, mauled to death by a lion.
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/02/28/africa/woman-killed-lion-...
The only reason my house cat has not murdered me is because he is 4kg, and I'm not. He loves me though.
My cat always looked at me like "if only you were smaller..."
I'd be getting scared when a cat reach the 20kg threshold. I'm about 90kg, so thats a 4.5x ratio :)
Cats are the perfect killing machines (apart from maybe sharks) :)
There's a bobcat that lives around here. He's on my porch now and then, and I also see its tracks in the snow.
It doesn't look like it wants to be petted. I stay clear.
A tamed lion ripped the face off of Melanie Griffith.
I believe that tri-colour house cats are all female. This is a tri-colour male.
Similar looking to the KodKod
Someone has been typing quickly...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tilcayo_tiger_cat
Oh wow, they are really beautiful. I can tell they are perfect killing machines behind the cuteness.
Murder mittens.
https://archive.ph/cgMTM
Positively tiny. Really makes you wonder what else is still out there.
Also an amusing disjoint between it being called "tiger" cat but having leopard spots. At least the latin name is more on point.
Since this cat is Bolivian, they would be jaguar spots, rather than leopard ones.
The conquistadors referred to the jaguars as "tigers" - they certainly aren't lions - and that custom stuck around for long enough for this to become a tiger cat!
To add to the confusion, the genus is Leopardus. And leopards and jaguars are both Panthera.
Awwwww pspspspsps kitty kitty ^_^
Wait, "pspspsps"? Where are you from? I thought only Greeks do "pspspsps".
My German grandmother did it, too.
No, it's somewhat common here in Brazil too.
I've heard that my whole life in the US. I think my dad taught it to me when I was really young, because he loves cats and our neighbors across the street had some outdoor cats.
And Romanians.
Can confirm that non-greek Americans do this as well.
We do it in Italy too, afair (I'm a bit in doubt if we also do "tch tch tch")
It’s very common in the USA.
We also do it in Spain, I think it is the international cat calling code.
We do it in America
pspspsps is biological , it's common noise to get a cats attention (in many places) because it stimulates their prey drive.
I'm from America, and we do spspspsp.
I for one welcome our new feline Overlords.
Desperately trying to find a video with the original meowing sound...
That's a good looking kitty!
On a related paw, Leopardus guigna (güiña) in Anticura goes by the cute name of kodkod:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kodkod#/media/File:Leopardus_g...
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Beautiful. Can't believe how mini and colorful.
Wow, I expected it to be a DNA based split or something like that, but a genuinely new to science mammal is pretty cool!
It always surprises me when people discover new animal species. These little kittens look very cute.
I'm curious if the locals knew it was distinct from other similar species, e.g. Oncilla/L. tigrinus, or if tilcayo is the locals' name for a broader set of 2+ visually similar species?