International Snow Leopard Day is also known as the World Snow Leopard Day. Since declared in 2013, the 23rd of October is a day to celebrate these beautiful, rarely-seen, reclusive big cats, sometimes referred to as ‘ghosts of the mountains’.
Inhabiting high altitudes, Snow Leopards can be found up to 20,000 feet high in the Himalayas, Southern Siberian Mountains, and Tibetan Plateau. To survive these harsh environments, they have the densest fur of all cats and use their tails for balance in the steep mountainous terrain in which they live. Their tails can grow up to 90% as long as their bodies and dub as blankets to cover sensitive parts of their bodies in the extreme cold.