Tilcayo cat news & timeline
We track every credible development on Leopardus tilcayo — species announcements, new wild records, IUCN decisions and peer-reviewed follow-ups — in one chronological timeline, with sources.
Story so far
- September 17–18, 2026
International media pick up the story: BBC Wildlife, New Scientist, MSN, ETToday and news agencies across Europe and Asia report the first new wild cat species described in more than a century. Chinese outlets translate the name as 蒂尔卡约虎猫. Baidu Baike creates an entry the same day.
- September 2026
The species description is published in Current Biology: DNA from 38 individuals (8 museum specimens) shows the tiger cat is five species; the Bolivian lineage is named Leopardus tilcayo after the local community name. A new Peruvian subspecies, L. tigrinus antisuyo, is described alongside. Read our full announcement breakdown.
- 2017 – 2025
The long quiet middle: a surrendered cat at Senda Verde sanctuary, years of fieldwork, sampling and genetic analysis led by Paola Nogales Ascarrunz and collaborators. See the discovery story.
- Upcoming
Camera-trap surveys in the Yungas to confirm wild populations · IUCN assessment of all five tiger-cat lineages · re-examination of museum specimens across South America.