Â
Asiatic
cheetah
                                 Hamidreza
Rastegar
                                                       Â
University of Pune
Abstract
We are currently losing the biological diversity on which we
depend at the rate that will greatly limit our future option. The distribution
of cheetah stretched from Palestine to Iran, and to the Arabian Peninsula and
eastward through Afghanistan to the Indian subcontinent. But over the years a
combination of habitat conversion and killing eliminated the species from much
of its range. At the turn of the century the only population that was known to
have any long-term survival prospects was in Iran. The African cheetahs thrive
in open grasslands and savannahs unlike the Iranian cheetah that live in vast
expanses of semi-desert and desert terrains dominated by foothills and
mountainous habitats where prey species such as wild sheep, wild goat and
gazelle is abundant. In Iran, biologists have estimated that perhaps as few as
50 cheetah remain………
