‘El Jefe’, AKA The Boss (Picture: Associated Press)

Take a glimpse, because it may be a while before we see El Jefe again.

He’s the only known wild jaguar in the entire United States, and showed up this week on a motion sensor camera set up to try and capture his movements.

The big cat, around seven years old, has lived in Arizona’s Santa Rita Mountains for more than three years. He’s said to be the last hold-out in the south west United States, where jaguars used to be a much more common species.

In the last 150 years their numbers have declined almost to nothing, as humans turned their habitat to towns and cities and killed them to protect their livestock.


Sorry, this video isn't available any more.

He’s the only known jaguar in the US (Picture: AP)

Now El Jefe (‘The Boss’ in Spanish) faces a new threat, with a copper mine proposed in his mountain home.



Conservationists say the open pit would make it difficult for El Jefe to carry on living his life, and they wanted to get footage of him to prove their case as it has not been given planning permission yet.

They left cameras in the wilderness where he lives, which are programmed to film when they sense movement.

He lives in Arizona (Picture: Center for Biological Diversity via AP)

MORE: Baby Rhino abandoned as a newborn becomes best friends with the team that rescued him

‘A lot of people have no idea that we have jaguars in the United States or that they belong here,’ said Randy Serraglio, from the Arizona-based Center for Biological Diversity.

‘In bringing this video, we hope to inspire people to care about these animals and support protection for their homes.’

A spokeswoman for the company that owns the proposed Rosemont mine, Hudbay Minerals, did not immediately comment.

Although it’s possible there may be more jaguars left than El Jefe that we just don’t know about, he is one of only four or five spotted in the last 20 years, and the only one seen at all more recently.