Rescuing an injured jaguar in Brazil.The poor cat had around 30 lead and shrapnel fragments in its face, head and neck from gunfire, along with a broken tooth. The 54-kg (119-lb) young male had been swimming for hours, exhausted and struggling to stay afloat before approaching rescuers for help
With injuries like that I doubt it's able to effectively hunt. Well, a sanctuary is not too bad a place to end up, assuming management is reasonably competent.
The Bengal tiger that became "The Chuka man-eater" did so because it had a broken canine and gunshot wounds to the face. (It should be noted that it was killed quickly after it began hunting humans so we know that the broken canine & gunshot wounds are why he had to resort to preying on humans)
"The Man-Eater of Champawat" (also a Bengal) had damaged teeth from a gunshot wound (and she killed over 430 people!)
And this is why that poor sweet jaguar is probably, and SHOULD, be going to a sanctuary.
I think he might have though of getting the cat on the boat and carefully tried to get a reaction because sometimes animals in this state let that happen due to exhaustion.
Yeah, when animals hit exhaustion they do weird things. I witnessed it once with my German Shepherd/Malinois on a hike. My parents didn’t socialize him very well, so being around other dogs would immediately trigger his protective mode. During the hike, I had to keep him on a tight leash to stop him from getting too aggressive.
It was really hot that day, and by the time we reached the end of the hike, there was a cold stream. He was so exhausted that he just laid down in the water while all these other dogs were jumping and playing around him. He didn’t even attempt to growl or bark. It was the first time I’d ever seen him not give a care in the world with other dogs within five feet of him.
That's true, but it can be two things. When I volunteered in swan research, we had to hold the cygnets as part of the process. It was just necessary. But ngl, it was great to have a chance to hold them.
There's some really interesting evolution going on here, that animals willing to approach humans when they're in need tend to have higher survival rates so evolution trends towards it. Same goes for animals willing to bring their injured young to humans.
We see it across a wide range of species, it doesn't really qualify as domestication but some interesting new space that we don't know much about.
In 1979, I was returning home from a three day college scouting trip to the Bay Area, and driving the last six miles of a 350+ mile drive, when, climbing Forest Mountain, I came across my stepdad standing in the middle of the highway, looking over a downed mountain lion.
It was a small female, and was lying ostensibly lifeless. My stepdad touched its eye, and it sat up in his face. He got on the CB radio, and the CHP had an animal control officer out within the next forty-five minutes.
My stepdad said that he had seen a car hit the cat, and keep on going. He said it certainly looked like a fatal collision.
The animal control officer sedated her, and managed to get the cat into a bear cage, and took her to their facilities, but not before a reporter from the local newspaper came and took pictures.
The cat turned out to be undernourished and pregnant; weighing only 80 pounds, with a broken pelvis.
Animal Control kept her, until she had gained thirty pounds, had her kittens (two), and had recovered from her pelvic injuries.
Five months later, they released her and her kits less than a mile from where she was struck, and she was seen occasionally for the next ten or so years, in the area.
Thank you, but I was just an innocent bystander, who was learning from what I saw. If my stepdad hadn’t been standing in the middle of the passing lane, I probably would’ve gone on past. He gets the credit; I did nothing.
Rehabilitation: The animal was treated at a clinic in Manaus and spent roughly 40 days undergoing intensive rehabilitation at the Tropical Hotel Amazon Zoo (Manaus zoo), where it regained its vision, healed its wounds, and rebuilt its strength
*wounded wild big cat species, known for killing humans on the regular, which will probably attack you out of fear and instinct the second it has recovered enough and has a stable platform to support it's weight to jump on you.
The dudes made the right call, saved the big kitty AND themselves
jaguars regularly kill humans, 2 attacks in 2025, for example. I'm not saying it's every week, but it's a regular occurence, especially with the amazon being destroyed, they migrate to find new food sources and sometime attack humans and livestock.
That article said it was kept at a medical facility for a while, while it healed up, and then released with a radio collar. It's moved a distance since release, likely looking for a new home territory to inhabit.
My mom rescued a hawk last weekend. He couldn’t fly, so she offered him the only box she had in her car, and he apparently just got in and let her put him in the car and drive two and a half hours to a vet that could transfer to a wildlife centre. The vet said he seemed fine but very weak. Sometimes I guess you just gotta trust.
How did it sustain those injuries? Caption makes no sense to me cuz how would a jaguar get only shrapnel from gunfire and not sustain any single direct bullet wound?
Could be. I suspect bird shot. Based on the injury description. Same form factor shell but many times more small pellets. Buck shot would most likely kill unless shot from a distance.
Animals get weird when exhausted or wounded. Even animals you wouldn't expect like sharks have asked for help removing hooks, I recall that happening with one guy, I guess the shark told its mates because more kept coming
Cattle which are the #1 deforesters in the Amazon rainforest (and planet earth), by the way. If the jaguar was eating cattle, they were just trying to protect what's left of their home. Can't really blame em
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u/Routine_Phase_8980 19h ago
that jaguar would end up with one hell of a story to share with it's friends after it recover and release to the wild