Mammals · plate 7 of 60
Leopard
Panthera pardus
Eats upstairs, lives anywhere, tells nobody anything.
Only 1.1% of people are Leopards. (estimated)
If you're a Leopard
You are adaptable, independent, and more capable than you let on. Leopards live everywhere from deserts to the suburbs of Mumbai and keep a low profile in all of them; you also fit in wherever you land and keep your business to yourself. You store things where others can't reach them, including your plans. People find out what you did afterward.
Leopards drag kills heavier than themselves up trees and wedge them in the branches, where lions and hyenas cannot follow.
The Leopard as a spirit animal
You are self-reliant, flexible, and quietly very good at what you do. You read situations fast and leave before anyone has worked out that you were there. The flaw is that privacy turns into secrecy, and the people who care about you learn things from the tree branches, after the fact. You don't need an audience. You have, however, noticed the lack of one.
Grounded in how the species actually lives; nothing borrowed from anyone's tradition. Why we put it that way.
How to get along with a Leopard
Do
- Let them work alone; the results arrive, the process does not.
- Give them a high place and a view; leopards rest in trees for a reason.
- Keep plans flexible; a leopard eats whatever the night offers, from beetles to antelope.
Don't
- Don't demand updates; a leopard's whole method is the absence of them.
- Don't expose them in a group; they do their best work unobserved.
When it goes wrong: A cornered leopard fights harder than animals twice its size; never corner one, and never block the way to the tree.
The Leopard in a relationship
You are private even in love. Leopards are solitary and pair only briefly, and the mother hides her cubs in rocks or thickets, moving them often, for about two years. You protect what is yours by keeping it out of sight. Your partner is well looked after and seldom introduced.
Field notes
Every animal is placed on six personality traits derived from how the species lives. Your answers are placed on the same six, and the closest animal wins. How the scoring works
- Sociability
- 1
- Boldness
- 7
- Energy
- 5
- Curiosity
- 7
- Devotion
- 6
- Roaming
- 4
- The leopard has the widest range of any big cat, from sub-Saharan Africa through the Middle East and India to the Russian Far East.
- Black panthers in Africa and Asia are leopards with a gene for dark fur; in strong light the spots are still visible.
- Leopards live wild inside the city limits of Mumbai, in and around a national park, and come out at night to hunt stray dogs.
Leopards in literature
- Bagheera — The Jungle Book, Rudyard Kipling (1894)
- The Leopard — Just So Stories (How the Leopard Got His Spots), Rudyard Kipling (1902)
- Sheeta — Tarzan of the Apes, Edgar Rice Burroughs (1912)
Characters from public-domain works. Company, not a verdict.
Closest personalities
The animals whose profiles sit nearest to the Leopard's. If you got Leopard, one of these was probably your runner-up.
Other mammals
WolfRed FoxBrown BearPolar BearLionTigerCheetahElephantGiraffeHippopotamusGorillaOrangutanSlothKoalaKangarooPlatypusOtterBeaverBadgerRaccoonHedgehogBatCamelDolphinSperm Whale
Among the 60
Gustav Mützel (1839–1893), Brehms Tierleben, Alfred Brehm (1890). Public domain, viacommons.wikimedia.org.All credits
