Snow leopards face mounting pressures from climate change, retaliatory killing, and poaching, requiring integrated conservation strategies across their vast mountain range.
Snow leopards navigating human-dominated landscapes face constant welfare challenges: risk of snare capture targeting other species, retaliatory poisoning after livestock kills, and stress from increased livestock presence in their core habitat. Individual welfare monitoring through camera traps and occasional GPS collaring has revealed high mortality from snares intended for other animals. Community-based livestock insurance schemes that compensate herders for snow leopard predation have proven effective at reducing retaliatory killings while maintaining coexistence.