Two rare jaguar cubs were born to a wild jaguar father and a mother who has lived all her life in captivity in Argentina.
The northern province of Chaco and conservation group Rewilding Argentina said on Wednesday that the cubs were born to Tania and Qaramta, whose name means ‘The One Who Cannot Be Destroyed’ in the regional Qom language.
With wild jaguars largely wiped out in the area around the Impenetrable national park, the cubs being born is a glimmer of light as conservationists try to re-grow population numbers.
“They are a kind of symbol, starting with the recovery of the jaguar in the Chaco that if we didn’t do something would end up becoming extinct,” Sebastián Di Martino, conservation director at Rewilding Argentina, said in an interview.
The two cubs were born in the early hours of Jan. 30, Di Martino said. They will be raised at the Impenetrable park until they are ready to be released to their natural habitat.