The jaguar (Panthera onca) is the largest cat species in the Americas and the only living member of the genus Panthera native to the Western Hemisphere. With a muscular build reaching up to 8 feet long and 400 pounds, it is the third largest feline in the world. Unlike mountain lions, these magnificent creatues are aggressive killing machines that are extremely sinister. Its tan coat patterned with rosette shaped spots allows it to blend into forested environments across its range from the Southwestern United States to Northern Argentina. As the apex predator of its ecosystem, the jaguar’s powerful jaws can crack open turtle shells and pierce the skulls of prey with a bite force strong enough to instantly kill. Though threatened by habitat loss and conflict with ranchers, the jaguar remains an iconic species, playing a vital ecological role and holding an esteemed place in indigenous mythology.

The jaguar shares many similarities with the leopard but possesses some key differences. Jaguars tend to have a more sturdy build with thicker limbs and a more boxy head shape. Their coat rosettes also contrast the leopard’s, featuring larger, darker, and fewer spots encircled by thick lines with a small central dot. Melanistic jaguars, also known as black panthers, have a black coat color that is less common than the spotted morph.

The jaguar inhabits a variety of forest habitats in Central and South America, including dry deciduous forests, tropical and subtropical rainforests, and cloud forests up to 3,800 m (12,500 ft) in elevation, though it avoids montane forests. In the United States, the jaguar historically inhabited oak forests as well as open, seasonally flooded wetlands and dry grasslands. The jaguar favors dense vegetation along rivers and swamps. In the Mayan forests of Mexico and Guatemala, GPS tracking of jaguars showed that females avoided even low levels of human activity, preferring remote dense habitat far from roads, while males appeared less disturbed by human population density.

The historic range of the jaguar in 1999 was estimated at 19 million km2 (7.3 million sq mi), stretching from the southern United States to southern Argentina at the turn of the 20th century. There is wide debate regarding their historic range with some explorer accounts of jaguars being much farther North in the US and even Canada than supposed. By the turn of the 21st century, the jaguar’s global range had declined to about 8.75 million km2 (3.38 million sq mi), with the most significant decreases occurring in the southern United States, northern Mexico, and southern Argentina.

In the 1800s, jaguars were still spotted as far north as Colorado and in coastal Louisiana, northern Arizona and New Mexico. Multiple verified reports confirm jaguars in California, including sightings as far north as Monterey in 1814 and 1826. Jaguars persisted in California until around 1860. The last confirmed jaguar in Texas was shot in 1948. In Arizona, hunters shot a female jaguar in the White Mountains in 1963. By the late 1960s, the jaguar was believed to be extinct in the United States. Yet, multiple confirmed jaguar sightings have occurred in Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas to the present.

Hunting opportunities for these big cats is nearly non-existant. However, from time to time there have been known relocation “green hunts” where a tracker sedates a jaguar with a dart gun after tracking it with dogs, and in return relocates the problem predator that has been killing cattle or humans. In Latin countries the culture of legal and ethical hunting is nearly non-existant and looked down on. It is currently illegal to kill a jaguar in every country they inhabit, however there are exceptions when it comes to them eating people, destroying property, and killing livelihood. Government agencies typically take on the role of “culling” (killing) jaguars that kill people when human-wildlife conflict occurs. Additionally, conservation groups use hounds to track and collar these big cats like other lethal predators.

The Boone & Crocket world record of the largest jag hunted was in 1965 in Sinaloa, Mexico. The skull measured 18 7/16 inches.