A Jaguar Cub Learns to Swim for the First Time

Unlike many other big cats, jaguars love water. For these wild felines, swimming isn’t just for fun; it’s essential to their survival. In this YouTube video, a young cub takes her very first swim as she learns how to be a true jaguar.

A Jaguar Cub’s First Swim

Maya, the young jaguar featured in this YouTube video, was born on July 11, 2017, at England’s Wingham Wildlife Park. Sadly, her mother wasn’t providing enough care or milk, and the newborn’s health quickly declined. When Maya was just five days old, she was moved to the home of Giles Clark, a big cat expert. Clark provided round-the-clock care for the tiny jaguar for the next three months. Despite his dedicated efforts, however, Maya struggled with coordination and vision, though veterinary tests couldn’t pinpoint the cause.

To help Maya, Clark began taking her to hydrotherapy, hoping that swimming would improve her coordination and strengthen her legs. Thankfully, these sessions paid off, and Maya’s condition improved. At three months old, she moved to The Big Cat Sanctuary, and at six months old, she moved into her own enclosure where she learned to live without human caretakers. Maya still lives at the sanctuary today, where she serves as an animal ambassador for jaguar conservation.

Why Swimming Is So Important for Jaguars

Hydrotherapy and swimming were vital to Maya’s recovery, allowing her to develop the coordination and strength she lacked as a kitten. This type of treatment might not work as well for many other cat species, as most aren’t exactly fond of water.

However, jaguars are different. They need water to survive and thrive in their natural habitats, and swimming is an enormous part of their lives. These incredible big cats live in the tropical rainforests of the Americas, environments dominated by rivers, wetlands, and lakes. Avoiding water in such places would be a major disadvantage. Fortunately for jaguars, they love the water and spend much of their time swimming. Jaguars use bodies of water to find food, escape threats, stay cool, and travel, giving them a significant advantage over other big cat species.

How Jaguars Are Built for Water

Jaguars have incredibly muscular and strong bodies that make them amazing swimmers, and they can even hold their breath underwater. This allows them to hunt, take down prey, and even cross vast waterways, such as the Panama Canal.

These big cats are also excellent climbers. They often perch in tall trees along riverbanks and waterways, patiently waiting for unsuspecting prey. When animals like caimans and capybara swim by, jaguars can leap directly from the trees into the water below, using their immense strength to drag their prey underwater. Sometimes, jaguars even hunt directly in the water, swimming and diving beneath the surface to catch turtles and fish.

An Island’s Fish-Eating Jaguars

Jaguars are thriving in the Maracá-Jipioca Ecological Station island reserve, a 230-square-mile island in the Atlantic off the Amazon coast, all thanks to their exceptional fishing skills. Large predators are not usually well suited to island life due to the limited space, but these jaguars have managed to adapt. Recent studies show that the jaguars living on these islands are most active during the daytime here (unlike their mainland relatives) and tend to spend more time in wetlands such as lagoons, channels, and coastal areas.

Researchers from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) have been collaring and monitoring the jaguars in the reserve. They have observed the big cats catching fish in mangrove ponds when the tide comes in, and even jumping directly into the sea to hunt. While researchers believe the jaguars also hunt monkeys, lizards, and deer, the sheer abundance of fish is likely the secret to their success on the islands.

While large carnivores like jaguars typically prefer bigger prey, they are adaptable and can switch to smaller, more common prey when necessary. This flexibility is crucial for jaguars, as they face many threats, including poaching, habitat loss and fragmentation, overhunting of their prey, conflicts with local communities, and the exotic pet trade. Jaguars have already lost nearly 50% of their original range and continue to lose vital habitat each year. Because of these challenges, jaguars are currently classified as a Near-Threatened species on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List.

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