Snow Leopard Conservation Timeline
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A timeline of important dates in snow leopard research and conservation history.
Read how we have grown and what we have accomplished over the last two decades.
Milestones in the Snow Leopard Trust's history appear along the left side of the timeline.
On the right side of the timeline, important events in snow leopard research, global conservation, and snow leopard range countries tell the story of the changing world in which we do our work.
Milestones in the Snow Leopard Trust's history appear along the left side of the timeline.
On the right side of the timeline, important events in snow leopard research, global conservation, and snow leopard range countries tell the story of the changing world in which we do our work.
| SLT Milestones | Year | Important Snow Leopard Events |
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1778 | The snow leopard is first described to science by the Russian naturalist Shreber. |
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1970 | Biologist George Schaller takes the first known photograph of a snow leopard in the wild, in Chitral Gol, Pakistan. (The image to the left is not the referenced image.) |
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1972 | Woodland Park Zoo's (WPZ) first snow leopards, Nicholas and Alexandra, arrive in Seattle the morning of March 1 from Soviet Central Asia. At that time, WPZ was one of only 21 zoos in the US and 40 zoos in the world to exhibit snow leopards. Helen Freeman, a zoo staff member, is instantly mesmerized. |
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1974 | Snow leopard listed as Endangered on the World Conservation Union/IUCN Red List. (This is the same classification accorded to the panda and the tiger.) |
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1978 | First International Snow Leopard Symposium is held in Helsinki, Finland. Scientists and zoo directors from North America, Europe, and Asia meet to share research information and discuss snow leopard conservation. |
| Helen Freeman founds the Snow Leopard Trust, one of the first conservation organizations to recognize the importance of addressing the needs of an entire ecosystem to ensure the survival of a predator species. | 1981 |  |
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1982 | With funding from a Snow Leopard Trust grant, researcher Rodney Jackson begins the first radio-collaring study of snow leopards in Nepal, giving us our first glimpses into the elusive cat's daily life in the wild. |
| The Trust and WPZ host the third International Snow Leopard Symposium in Seattle. Six symposia have occurred since then, and the Trust has sponsored or cosponsored each. | 1982 |  |
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1984 | The American Zoo and Aquarium Association (AZA) Snow Leopard Species Survival Plan is officially launched, with Helen Freeman as the first chair, and has since grown into a mature program that has had great success in achieving snow leopard breeding goals. |
| In collaboration with the US Fish and Wildlife Service, the Snow Leopard Trust launches the Snow Leopard Information Management System, a series of standardized research procedures that has since been adopted by nearly all snow leopard researchers around the world—a situation that may be unique in the world of wildlife biology. | 1987 |  |
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early 1990s | As a result of the breakup of the Soviet Union and the subsequent independence of several new Central Asian states, the number of countries in which snow leopards occur in the wild increases by 50% (from 8 to 12). |
| The Trust and AZA initiate a "Natural Partnerships" program, in which zoos contribute funding to support the Trust's snow leopard conservation efforts. In turn, zoos receive unique opportunities to link their education programs with the Trust's activities in snow leopard range countries. The program has since recruited the membership of more than 30 zoos in the US and overseas. | 1997 |  |
| In a small village in western Mongolia, Irbis Enterprises is launched and the first woollen handicrafts produced by participants are marketed in the capital of Ulaanbaatar. "Irbis" is Mongolian for "snow leopard." The program later changes its name to Snow Leopard Enterprises and becomes a conservation program of the Snow Leopard Trust. | 1997 |  |
| With the help of a matching grant from WPZ, the Trust is able to hire key new personnel, including a new Conservation Director and a Program Officer based in Seattle, and Program Directors in Pakistan and India. | 2001 |  |
| May 21-25: The Trust and WPZ host the ninth Snow Leopard Symposium titled the Snow Leopard Survival Summit. Participants evaluated the current threats to the snow leopard's existence, coordinated plans to address these threats, identified research holes that require further study, and organized educational programs within and outside of range countries. | 2002 |  |
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2004 | Membership in the Snow Leopard Network, a consortium of individuals and organizations dedicated to conservation of the cat that was created at the 2002 Survival Summit, reaches 100 professionals. The Secretariat of the Network is located at Snow Leopard Trust headquarters in Seattle. |
| India Program Director Charudutt Mishra wins the Whitley Gold Award, one of conservation’s highest honors. | 2005 | 
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