Man-eating leopard on the loose in Nepal, suspected of eating 15 people
A rare Amur leopard was photographed at the Hunchun Amur Tiger National Nature Reserve in northern China.
A leopard with an appetite for human flesh is on the loose in Nepal. The leopard is believed to have eaten 15 villagers in the past year. The latest victim was a 4-year-old boy, ABC News reported. His head was found in a forest on Saturday.
Officials believe that the leopard dragged the child away into the jungle before eating him. "Since human blood has more salt than animal blood, once wild animals get the taste of salty blood they do not like other animals like deer," an ecologist told the Daily Times of Pakistan.
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Officials are offering a 25,000-rupee prize, several months' wages for the average Nepali,to anyone who can hunt the animal down, Agence France Presse reported. More than 100 police and soldiers have already failed to capture it.
"In the beginning, we wanted to capture it alive. But the security personnel who returned from the search said that thousands of villagers have been terrorized," said Hariraj Bista, a local government official in Baitadi district, told the AFP. He added that villagers are now afraid to leave their homes after dark."Therefore, we have offered this bounty to encourage local hunters to either kill it or capture it alive."