In recent years, Gansu’s Subei County has increased ecological conservation efforts. Yanchiwan National Nature Reserve has seen frequent snow leopard activity with infrared cameras capturing a number of snow leopard images.

Snow leopards mainly live at an altitude of 2,500-5,000 meters. They are a national-level protected animal and were classified as an endangered species by the World Conservation Union (IUCN). Also, due to their lonely and elusive nature, they are also known as the “Snow Mountain Hermit”.

Since Subei County Yanchiwan National Nature Reserve installed infrared cameras, they have captured 160 images of snow leopards.

Currently, they are identifying individual leopards from the infrared cameras by looking at the fur patterns, to establish a snow leopard individual database for Yanchiwan and lay a solid foundation for further snow leopard population estimates.

In addition, the infrared cameras also captured images of other wildlife, including brown bears, wolves, jackals, lynx, stone martens, red foxes, manuls, blue sheep, Tibetan wild ass, white-lipped deer and other mammals.

They also captured images of many bird species, including snow cocks, chukar partridge, highland partridge and a variety of birds of prey, reflecting the diversity of the food chain in the region.