It is a rare genetic mutation in the animal world. An albino puma was born a month ago in a zoo in Nicaragua, where it is still protected from the gaze of visitors, the animal park announced. “We are taking all the measures to ensure that he is in the best possible state of health alongside his mother,” Carlos Molina, veterinarian at the Thomas Belt zoo in Juigalpa, some 140 km from Managua, said on Wednesday.
“He is in good health, in good physical condition,” he added, of the little white puma born on July 20. At birth, the coat of common cougars is light brown or reddish with black spots. The genetic mutation causing white pigmentation is rare in animal species, especially pumas.
The little puma isolated with his mother
“We are happy to have it, because it does not happen very often,” said Carlos Molina. The cougar is the second largest feline in the Americas after the jaguar, and the fourth in the world after the tiger and the lion.
Zoo keepers are avoiding contact with the little puma, which is growing up with its mother in a cave in a fenced enclosure, and hope that in two months it will be able to receive first veterinary treatment.