The winners have been announced in Leopard Keeper, a contest to name seven of these extremely rare wild cats residing in Land of the Leopard National Park. The contest jury, made up of park employees and representatives of environmental protection organisations, selected the top seven of the approximately 200 contestants whose jobs or hobbies are in some way connected with Far Eastern leopard conservation. Within a week, these seven leopards will receive their new names.

The winners are:

1. Legion, an environmental protection club at the secondary school located in the village of Kraskino, Primorye Territory.

2. Irina Agapova of the Children and Youth Development Centre, Vladivostok, Primorye Territory.

3. Lotos, a civic environmental organisation at the secondary school located in the Khasan municipal district, Primorye Territory.

4. Friends of Land of the Leopard, an environmental patrol at Secondary General Education School No. 1, located in the town of Slavyanka, Primorye Territory.

5. Green League, an environmental movement in the Nadezhdinskoye municipal district, Primorye Territory.

6. VladNews, a news agency based in Vladivostok, Primorye Territory.

7. Alpha-Cubs team, located in Nakhodka, Primorye Territory.

“The winners include both individuals and organisations, all of them from the Primorye Territory, which seems appropriate to me,” Anton Semyonov, a jury member and WCS Russia project manager, said in an interview. “It’s these people that the future of the Far Eastern leopard depends upon, and so naturally this contest was of particular interest to them. At the same time, I must say that we received very good entries from other regions of Russia, some of which fell just a few points short of winning.”

Interesting entries from other regions did not escape the jury’s attention. For some of the jurors, the level of interest in leopards demonstrated by people in central Russia came as a surprise.

“Generally speaking, I didn’t expect residents of Russia’s central regions to be that interested in the issue of Far Eastern leopard conservation,” said Alexander Vrishch, a jury member and educational projects coordinator at the Phoenix Fund. “Sizable groups from those regions took part in the contest. And I was especially pleased by the fact that half of the entries highlighted really useful, practical work that is being done.”

The winners have a week to let the contest organisers know the names they have chosen.