Forest Department has, on Thursday night, captured the first camera trap images of the leopard which is giving sleepless nights to villagers in Yacharam mandal of Ranga Reddy district.
The big cat, roaming within a periphery of 29 to 30 kilometres around Yacharam, has so far killed about 10 to 15 animals, mostly cattle and sheep/goats.
After receiving several complaints from the villagers over the past two months, the department has set up camera traps and cages with baits in order to capture the animal.
In Thursday’s pictures, the animal could be seen approaching its kill, a calf, which it had lifted from some village.
“The animal is quite big for a leopard, and could easily weigh around 65 to 70 kilograms. Going by its size, we are surmising it could be a male aged around five years, but could not confirm the sex from the images,” said an official from the department.
The feline might have strayed into the scrub jungle of Yacharam from forests nearby, officials say. Owing to scarcity of its natural prey in the densely populated region, it must be marauding from the villages.