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The cheetah originated about 4,000,000 years ago, long before the other big cats. The oldest fossils place it in North America in what is now Texas, Nevada and Wyoming. It was common throughout Asia, Africa, Europe and North America until the end of the last Ice Age, about 10,000 years ago, when massive climatic changes caused large numbers of mammals to disappear. All cheetah in North America and Europe and most of those in Asia and Africa vanished. Some experts think our present populations were derived from inbreeding by those very few surviving and closely related animals. This inbreeding "bottleneck", as theorized, led to the present state of cheetah genetics: all cheetah alive today appear to be as closely related as identical twins.

Throughout recorded history a cheetah pelt was a badge of wealth for its human owner. The animal was killed for its skin by some and captured for its hunting skills by others. But most recently, human excess is probably the major factor dramatically pushing the cheetah toward extinction. As human populations disproportionately increase in size other species are "squeezed out" - their living space becomes more limited as does their food supply. Many animals feel the pinch and are at great risk of disappearing forever. In 1900 there were only about 100,000 cheetah worldwide - present estimates place their number at 10 to 15 thousand with about 1/10 of those living in captivity. Namibia has the largest population of wild cheetah - about 2500.

I am still a cat I


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ISO : 100
Film : Velvia Slide
Exposure Program : Aperture Priority
Focal Length : 200mm
Focus Distance : ~30m/100ft
Flash : No
Tripod : No
Web Size : no crop
Slide Scanner : Microtek Artixscan 4000t
Scan Size : 2000dpi @ 3,7D