Snow Leopard Elegy

Chapter 2 Snow Leopard Elegy (2)
If the snow demon has never left the snowy forest and is an authentic wild snow leopard, at this stage, it should become the mother snow leopard's right-hand man when hunting, just like a student who is about to graduate, who has almost mastered the teachings taught by the teacher. He has learned all the knowledge, and although his hunting skills are not as proficient as that of an adult snow leopard, he can already rely on his own strength to obtain prey.According to the book, some snow leopards who mature quickly leave their mothers before they are two years old.

As soon as he stepped out of the wooden fence of the observation station, the Snow Demon roared excitedly, flicked its fluffy and beautiful tail, and quickly disappeared into the bushes.Qiangba asked worriedly: "Will it never come back?" I smiled and said, "If it really never comes back, it would be a happy event for the two of us to have a drink, which can save us a lot of money." Trouble. You don’t have to worry about it, it doesn’t have the ability to live independently yet, it can’t live without us, it won’t run far.”

What I said is well-founded. In the wild, little snow leopards have to learn how to find a safe nest, learn how to forage, and practice several times in the jungle to confirm that they can hunt food without the help of the mother snow leopard. Will part ways with the mother snow leopard.Survival dependence is the most powerful attraction, and you will not give up easily unless you have to.

As I expected, about 10 minutes later, the snow demon vomited from the southeast corner of the bush. Qiangba and I walked over to have a look. .I patted its head and said: "Don't be naughty, come with us!" It got up, opened a distance of about ten meters from us, and followed us to Yunshanping.

There is an obvious difference between cats and canines. They follow their owners when they go out. If it is a dog, they will follow behind the owner like a shadow. Even if there is any abnormal movement on the roadside that attracts its attention, run It's time to go out to watch the excitement, but as long as the master yells, he will quickly run to the master.Cats are different. Whether it is a cat, mountain leopard or tiger, they will keep a certain distance from their owners when they go out, and they will not answer when they are called.

We use Yunshanping as a training ground for snow demons to hunt prey, and we have three favorable conditions: It is a typical alpine grassland with abundant pastures. Jamba and I have scouted it a long time ago, and a herd of red deer will come here to graze every day. ; Surrounded by dense spruce forest, it is convenient for the snow demon to use the feline's specialty of approaching the prey secretly; the grassland is in the shape of a belt, about seven kilometers long from north to south, flat and open, easy for the snow demon to chase the fleeing deer.

Luckily, as soon as I came to the spruce forest, I heard Yoyo Luming.I raised the binoculars and saw that a group of about seven or eight red deer were eating on the grassland, about 300 meters away from where we were.The 300-meter distance is divided into two sections, the first 200 meters are forests, and the last 100 meters are grasslands.As long as we pay attention to concealment, don't make any noise, don't disturb the deer herd, quietly walk through the 200-meter forest, and when we reach the grassland, the snow demon suddenly launches an attack, and it is possible to pounce on a red deer.

Hearing the sound of the deer, the Snow Demon rushed to our side in a few steps. I have never seen it so excited. The leopard's ears kept trembling, its eyes sparkled as if electrified, and the tip of its tail was as lively as a small loach. Jump on the ground.I was overjoyed for a while, this shows that there is a predator's instinct lurking in the snow demon, and there is a strong urge to hunt.I think, for an animal like the snow leopard, this is a healthy and normal psychological expression, and it is also the most basic psychological quality for it to return to the mountains in the future.

Qiangba and I bent our backs and were about to lead the snow demon to touch the group of red deer quietly. At this moment, the snow demon suddenly straightened his neck and opened his mouth to roar.With such a long distance, the roar is equivalent to calling the police to these red deer: a ferocious snow leopard is coming to catch you, run away!
With sharp eyes and quick hands, Qiangba grabbed the back of Snow Demon's neck with one hand, and the satchel he was carrying with him with the other, and slammed the open leopard's mouth shut.The Snow Demon struggled, purring slightly from the corner of its mouth, and finally forced it to swallow the roar.It probably felt that it was an unfriendly and offensive behavior for Qiangba to grab the nape of its neck and stuff its mouth with a satchel. It took a step back, turned its head and bit Qiangba's wrist, so scared that Qiangba quickly let go and let go of the nape of its neck. .It looked at Jamba angrily with its big copper bell eyes, and let out a series of low growls from the back of its throat, as if protesting Jamba's rudeness.

"Hey, I didn't mean to hurt you," Jamba pointed to the deer grazing on the grassland, and said in a low voice, "You can't roar, the red deer have very good hearing, and they will scare you when you bark." Run. You have to walk over quietly, with as light a footstep as possible, so that you can catch the red deer." In order to let the snow demon understand his meaning, he also imitated the posture of a snow leopard on all fours, spying ghostly, tiptoeing crawl.

I paid attention to observe the reaction of the snow demon, as if he didn't understand Qiangba's kindness, he still grinned ferociously.Suddenly, it jumped out with a whoosh, took big steps without any scruples, and rushed towards the red deer herd on the grassland.The woods are dense, with bushes growing among the big trees.Its body bent branches and snapped vines, making a ping-pong-pong sound that could be heard three miles away if the wind was down.What's worse, it seems that it is afraid that the deer will not know that it is coming, so it vomits and roars while running.The red deer is a kind of alert and timid animal, with a very keen sense of hearing. Before the snow demon could rush out of the woods, the herd of deer turned around and ran away quickly.By the time the Snow Demon ran into the grassland, the deer herd had escaped for more than a kilometer, and only a cloud of dust could be seen rapidly moving towards the distant valley.The snow demon chased it for another distance, and soon, the herd of deer disappeared into the valley with deep grass and dense forest, and disappeared without a trace.

Jamba and I rushed to Yunshanping and found the Snow Demon in a rhododendron bush. It was probably the first time that it was exercising violently, lying on its side on the ground, its chest heaving violently, and panting heavily.

The snow leopard is extremely explosive. Among the large beasts, its running speed is second only to the African cheetah. It can reach [-] kilometers per hour, but its endurance is limited. It is a veritable sprinter, and its best pursuit distance is about one kilometer.That is to say, within a distance of one kilometer, a snow leopard can chase its prey at a speed of [-] kilometers per hour. Beyond this distance, its heartbeat and panting, and its speed slows down significantly.Therefore, snow leopards usually use surprise attacks to hunt for food. After finding the prey they are interested in, they use the terrain and features to approach the target quietly, get as close as possible, and then pounce on the panicked prey with lightning speed, trying to catch them in the shortest time. Prey fell.Exposing yourself too early and frightening the prey is a taboo for snow leopards.

"What a great opportunity, let it go to waste." Champa said regretfully, "If it listens to me, it will run out of the woods lightly, without roaring, and it won't be so tired that it's a waste of time of."

"Can it understand what you say?" I teased, "You are playing the piano against the cow."

"Then what do you say?"

"Just let it try a few more times. Failure is the mother of success. It may learn from it, find out a little experience, and learn how to approach the prey in a concealed way." I thought for a while and said.

Qiangba and I tried several times in a row. We went to Shenyang Ridge to hunt blue sheep, went to the Nu River to ambush wild boars, and went to chase Tibetan antelope near Yakou in Snow Mountain. Unfortunately, Snow Demon seems to lack the ability to sum up experience. Every time when we are still far away from the prey, we recklessly start to attack, and make unnecessary roars. It is majestic, but it is tantamount to informing the prey at a critical moment. The prey escapes, and we have nothing to do with it.The most terrible thing is that after several aborted hunts, Snow Demon seems to be less and less interested in the game of chasing herbivores, and it may also be that he has less and less confidence in whether he can catch these alert herbivores .Take it to the hunting ground and see the prey from a distance. It no longer has its eyes shining, its ears quivering and its tail tip jumping around like a loach, showing an impatient look. Instead, it looks flatly, without passion or impulse in its eyes. .Let it go hunting, it chased for a few steps, once the prey ran away, it restrained its steps and did not want to chase anymore.

"It knows that it can't catch up with these antelopes, and it's useless to work hard, so it doesn't want to waste effort." Looking at the snow demon lying lazily on the ground, Qiangba said with a wry smile.

My heart is heavy.From the point of view of animal psychology, repeated failed stimuli will accumulate into a mental set of failures, which will form a lesion in the cerebral cortex. In the future, when encountering similar herbivores, psychological hints will appear and conditioned reflexes will form. I can't catch them, and I can't catch them.If it continues to develop, confidence will be lost, self-esteem will rise sharply, and it will become a mental illness, which will have a very harmful impact on future life.It is necessary to reverse it in time when this failure mentality is just emerging.The most effective way is of course to try to let the snow demon successfully hunt once. The brilliance of victory can effectively dispel the haze of failure that hangs over his heart. The hot sheep blood, tearing the fresh lamb, will definitely raise the joy and pride of the predator in the heart, and the self-confidence will suddenly double, and the memory of failure will be wiped clean.

As soon as I said my thoughts, Qiangba immediately agreed: "Yes. Dogs who have been bitten by wolves several times will tremble with fright when they see dried wolf skins; Seeing the shadow of a wolf, it will bravely rush up to fight the wolf. It is time for the snow demon to experience the taste of success, even if it is only once, it will be very beneficial to it.”

The question is, how do you get the snow demon to take down the nimble herbivore?

Jamba suggested shooting the prey's legs with a shotgun, and the prey would not be able to run fast after being injured, so that the snow demon could catch up to the prey and throw it down.I thought about it, and felt that this approach was inappropriate.First of all, the prey that snow leopards are interested in are almost without exception the clear objects of protection in the "Wild Animal Protection Law". Because the snow leopard itself is a wild animal, it is not restricted by this law, no matter it is a class of protected animals The Tibetan antelope is still a second-class protected animal, blue sheep, and it is not illegal to hunt and kill it; I, as a zoologist, commit crimes knowingly, and the crime is aggravated.Second, as soon as the gunshot rang out, the Snow Demon must have been frightened, and maybe stopped chasing it, or fled to a certain place to hide. Could it be that the mutton was not eaten, but the whole body became smelly?Third, even if we can find a reason to cover up the sense of guilt, the snow demon was not too frightened after the gunshot and threw the prey down. Thinking, anyway, when the mountains and rivers are at the end, there will always be noble people to help, and suddenly the willow bank will bloom, and you will no longer try your best to fight hard?You know, it will return to the jungle in the future, and there will never be someone to help it shoot its prey for it to slaughter.

Jamba came up with another idea, that is, to go to the shepherd to buy a live sheep and bring it back as a live target for the Snow Demon, so that the Snow Demon could practice how to kill and tear up the prey.Champa said that when his mother cat catches a mouse, it does not kill it immediately, but brings it back to the nest and gives it to the kitten to play with, training the kitten to catch mice, which is very effective.

During my field investigation in Xishuangbanna last year, I witnessed a South China tigress biting the leg of a yellow deer, and dragging the poor little yellow deer to the tiger's den, so that its baby cubs could practice hunting skills on the little yellow deer.I know that although this method is cruel, it can guarantee the Snow Demon to gain valuable experience in hunting and killing living creatures.Besides, buying a goat and slaughtering it is a normal commodity trade and will not violate the Wild Animal Protection Law.When domestic sheep are brought up, they will be slaughtered anyway. There is not much difference in essence between having their throats cut with sharp knives and their necks bitten off by the sharp teeth of snow leopards, so there is no need to have too many moral concerns.

But after thinking about it for a long time, I still shook my head decisively.This method sounds perfect, but if you think about it carefully, it may cause adverse sequelae.So far, Snow Demon is still a snow leopard that hasn't killed anyone.People like to use virgins as metaphors for things that have never happened or are experienced for the first time. For example, the first published work of a writer is called a virgin work, and the land that has not been cultivated is called a virgin land. Using this traditional metaphor, the snow demon can be called a virgin. It is a virgin beast, and the first time it kills a living creature can be regarded as a virgin kill.I know that for carnivores, hunting for the first time is very important. What kind of prey to catch, how to catch it, and how it tastes, these fresh feelings will strongly stimulate the cerebral cortex, a memory area in the brain Engrave a deep imprint, which will be unforgettable for a lifetime.Buy a sheep to make a living target. Wild sheep such as domestic sheep and blue sheep and Tibetan antelope are not only very different in appearance, but also have very different tempers and personalities. Domestic sheep have a gentle temperament and will not resist when encountering violence. Compared with wild sheep, when a large beast roars and frightens, its limbs will tremble and collapse on the ground, turning into a pile of mutton at its mercy and slaughtered; killing domestic sheep is compared with hunting wild sheep, and you don't have to worry about being caught by the horns. To pierce the belly, you don't need to spend a lot of effort chasing after it, it saves you a lot of worry and effort, and the domestic mutton is more delicate and tender than wild mutton; it is entirely possible that the snow demon killed the domestic mutton for the first time hunting Sheep cannot forget the relaxed and happy feeling. When hunting wild sheep in the future, it will be difficult, so she will suffer from a partial eclipse. When she walks out of the nature reserve at the southern foot of Gaoligong Mountain, she frequently patronizes the flocks guarded by shepherds and sheepdogs. Become a rogue snow leopard, not everyone strictly abides by the "Wild Animal Protection Law" like me, it will inevitably die at the gunpoint of the hunter in the end!
"This doesn't work, that doesn't work either, so you have to figure out a good way to get out!" Qiangba said.

I scratched my head for a long time, but I couldn't come up with any good ideas. I had no choice but to continue to ask Qiangba for suggestions: "Qiangba, don't be discouraged, think about it again. Oh, you can't use domestic sheep instead of wild sheep A live target, it will hurt it; and you can't shoot the prey's legs, which is too obvious to help. The ideal is to help it catch up and capture the prey without letting it know that it is us I'm helping it. Do you understand what I mean? The help should be in the dark, so that it feels that it has caught the prey by its own efforts and luck, so it will be good for it to face life alone in the future."

Qiangba is indeed an old hunter who has been in the mountains and forests for decades. He has a lot of experience in this field. He frowned and thought for a while, and then said slowly: "How about this, after I find the prey, I will first calculate its escape route, and then I will find the prey. Tie a rope halfway, trip it up, and the Snow Demon can catch up and throw it down."

As soon as I heard it, I thought it was a good idea. Tripping a blue sheep or Tibetan antelope with a rope is at most a vicious joke with wild animals. It is completely different from shooting wild animals and does not violate the "Wild Animal Protection Law." ;The prey ran away in a hurry after realizing the danger, and it was entirely possible to trip over the vines and branches entrenched in the grass when they were anxious. Although it was an accidental accident, it was within the normal category. In the dark, you only need to tighten the rope when the prey is approaching, the movement is small, there is no sound, the concealment is strong, and no flaws are exposed.The snow demon would never dream that it is because we are helping it that it gets its prey.It will feel that hunting is successful only by its own unremitting efforts, which is of great benefit to it to get rid of dependence and enhance self-confidence.

I nodded and agreed, and implemented it according to this plan.

Everything went smoothly. When the first ray of sunshine shone on the snow peak of Gaoligong Mountain in the morning, we found a herd of argali in Gamar Grassland under the snow line.Jamba made a detour to a miscellaneous forest just north of the grassland, tied one end of the strong cowhide rope to a red pine tree, and held the other end in his hand, hiding behind the bushes.The long cowhide rope curled up in the grass like a hibernating snake.When I saw through the binoculars that Jamba was waving a small red flag to signal to me that everything was ready, I led the snow demon along a dirt ditch washed out by snow water, and touched the group of argali.

Same as the previous few times, with a distance of 300 meters, the Snow Demon couldn't hold back the excitement and urge to hunt, and jumped out of the ditch with a whiz, roaring and rushing towards the argali who was gnawing grass with its head down.Qiangba's calculation was very accurate, and the frightened Argali really ran towards his ambush.The Snow Demon chased after him hard.Snow Leopard is indeed a sprinter, and its explosive power is indeed amazing.At the beginning, the distance between the hunter and the hunted was shortened rapidly, but because the snow demon exposed himself too early and attacked too early, the absolute distance between the two sides was too long at the start. After chasing for one kilometer, the two sides were still about 50 meters apart.After chasing for another distance, the weakness of Snow Demon's lack of stamina appeared, and the speed gradually slowed down, while the Argali still maintained the high speed at the beginning by virtue of its strong endurance and frenzy for escape.After a while, the gap between the two sides widened to 300 meters.The snow demon may feel that the general trend is over, and it will be too late to catch up, or it may fail and lose the confidence to continue chasing. Its flat tail droops and its tightened waist begins to stretch, which shows that it He already had the idea of ​​giving up this pursuit, and after chasing for another ten or twenty steps at most, he was about to restrain his pace and stop.

(End of this chapter)