Snow leopards face multiple welfare threats including habitat loss, prey depletion, retaliatory killing, and poaching across their Central Asian range.
Snow leopard welfare is intertwined with human-wildlife coexistence challenges across mountain communities in Asia. Herders facing livestock losses to snow leopards sometimes retaliate lethally, driving population declines. Conservation programs that compensate herders for livestock losses and provide predator-proof corrals can dramatically reduce retaliatory killing while improving human livelihoods. Individual welfare concerns include snare injuries, which are painful and often fatal, and the stress of human encroachment on territories.