This Amur Leopard New To Brookfield Zoo

BROOKFIELD, IL — There's a new cat in town, the Brookfield Zoo announced Monday. Mina is a 2-year-old amur leopard, which came this fall from a zoo in New York.

Since Mina's arrival, she has been getting acclimated to her off-exhibit space as well as the animal care staff, according to a zoo news release.

Recently, the zoo gave Mina access to her outdoor habitat, where guests can now see her. The zoo said she has a few physical features that distinguish her from the zoo's other two amur leopards, Lisa and Sasha. Mina's tail is longer than Lisa's, and it does not have the distinctive curl, like at the end of Sasha's tail, the release said.

In early 2023, the zoo plans to pair Mina with Sasha, who is nearly 2 years old.

The amur leopard is critically endangered with less than 100 left in the wild, with threats to the species including illegal wildlife trading, habitat loss and fragmentation due to deforestation, climate change, and retribution hunting, according to the news release. The amur leopard’s entire estimated range is about 965 square miles, including the Russian Far East and northeast China.