{"id":179490,"date":"2025-10-04T22:45:09","date_gmt":"2025-10-04T22:45:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/179490\/"},"modified":"2025-10-04T22:45:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-04T22:45:09","slug":"jaguar-swims-record-distance-to-get-to-a-random-island-why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/179490\/","title":{"rendered":"Jaguar Swims Record Distance to Get to a Random Island\u2014Why?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A <a href=\"https:\/\/www.biorxiv.org\/content\/10.1101\/2025.09.05.674446v1.full.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">scientific research paper<\/a> awaiting peer review explains how a jaguar that once lived on mainland Brazil must have swum at least 1.27 km (0.8 miles) to a forested island in the Serra da Mesa Reservoir. Thanks to trail cameras, scientists have proof that this particular male jaguar was on the mainland <a href=\"https:\/\/www.livescience.com\/animals\/jaguars\/jaguar-in-brazil-smashes-record-for-the-species-longest-documented-swim\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">in May 2020<\/a>. In August 2024, trail cams spotted the same jaguar on an island, which is separated from the mainland by over a mile of water. <\/p>\n<p>Scientists assume the jaguar swam there, and the two most likely possibilities are 1) a direct 2.48-km (1.5-mile) crossing, or 2) an alternative path involving a \u201cstepping-stone islet,\u201d which would require a 1.06-km (0.7-mile) swim followed by a 1.27-km (0.8-mile) swim. Even if the jaguar took the stepping-stone path, a 1.27-km swim beats the previously recorded longest swim by a jaguar by six times.<\/p>\n<p>[RELATED: <a href=\"https:\/\/outdoors.com\/trail-cams-capture-new-photos-of-rare-jaguar-in-arizona\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Trail Cams Capture New Photos of Rare Jaguar in Arizona<\/a>]<\/p>\n<p>The study\u2019s authors say the longest previously verified jaguar swim is about 200 meters or 0.1 miles. But why did this jaguar swim so far?<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.livescience.com\/animals\/jaguars\/jaguar-in-brazil-smashes-record-for-the-species-longest-documented-swim\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Talking to Live Science<\/a>, lead author Leandro Silveira called the record \u201cso surprising,\u201d because there\u2019s no obvious reason for the animal to have ventured out so far.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPrey in this region appears to be fairly evenly distributed,\u201d Silveira said. \u201cNothing suggests the island has more prey, nor do the shorelines. We think he decided to explore a new area\u2014more likely related to searching for females or territory than a lack of food.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>See camera-trap evidence of the jaguar on the mainland and on the island here:<\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1200\" height=\"370\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/Screenshot-2025-10-01-at-10.21.40-AM.jpeg\" alt=\"jaguar swims island\" class=\"wp-image-135455\"  \/>Camera-trap records from the mainland (A) and the island (B). <br \/>Image by Silveira et. al. (CC BY 4.0)<\/p>\n<p>Read the full study (not yet peer reviewed) <a href=\"https:\/\/www.biorxiv.org\/content\/10.1101\/2025.09.05.674446v1.full.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Header stock image by Bas Vermolen\/Getty Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A scientific research paper awaiting peer review explains how a jaguar that once lived on mainland Brazil must&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":179491,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[53016,90,56,54,55,4407,79645],"class_list":{"0":"post-179490","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-jaguar","9":"tag-science","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom","13":"tag-wildlife","14":"tag-wildlife-research"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179490"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179490\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}