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We bring you the finest handmade stuffed plush animals in the World
Big Furry Friends is your source for Lifesize, Life Size, Life-like and Realistic Large Plush Stuffed Animals
Not just great gifts for children and adults, these beautiful pieces make great corporate gifts, baby gifts and display pieces for homes, office and businesses, theatrical displays, commercial and movie props......
All our animals are hand-made from of the finest plush stuffed animal artisans in the world. They are life-like, some lifesize and all realistic with careful attention to detail. They make an impressive gift whether corporate or personal, but also make a statement as a corporate mascot or display at your company's headquarters. Our plush animals are used for staging homes for sale, creating themed weddings, conventions and events where these furry friends add a real 'wow' factor. Our life-like plush stuffed animals have also been used in museums, as well as theatrical props in movies, commercials and on live stage productions all over the world. What is contained here is a sampling of what our artisans have to offer...
Do you need a true-to life size T-Rex? A giant Wooly Mammoth or other animal for your Museum?
If you can imagine it, we can create it for you!
Lifesize, Life-like and Large Plush Stuffed Animals - Sleepy, Floppy Leopard Cub
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Leopard Cub, Sleeping
Handmade
Item # 18RM64
Size: 7"L x 7"W x 15.75"H
Price: $ 64
This is a hand-crafted collection of realistic plush, sometimes lifesize animals. The "coat" of each animal is meticulously cut by hand, never stamped out by machine. Gentle paws, swishing tails, and especially soulful eyes and faces are lovingly detailed to give each character a life-like look.
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The leopard, Panthera pardus, is a member of the Felidae family and the smallest of the four "big cats" in the genus Panthera, the other three being the tiger, lion and jaguar. Once distributed across eastern and southern Asia and Africa, from Siberia to South Africa, the leopard's range of distribution has decreased radically because of hunting and loss of habitat. It is now chiefly found in sub-Saharan Africa; there are also fragmented populations in Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, Indochina, Malaysia, and China. Because of its declining range and population, it is listed as a "Near Threatened" species by the IUCN.
Compared to other members of the Felidae family, the leopard has relatively short legs and a long body with a large skull. It is similar in appearance to the jaguar, but is smaller and more slightly built. Its fur is marked with rosettes similar to those of the jaguar, but the leopard's rosettes are smaller and more densely packed, and do not usually have central spots as the jaguars do. Both leopards and jaguars that are melanistic (completely black or very dark) are known as black panthers.
The species' success in the wild is in part due to its opportunistic hunting behavior, its adaptability to habitats, its ability to run at speeds approaching 58 kilometres per hour (36 mph), its unequaled ability to climb trees even when carrying a heavy carcass, and its notorious ability for stealth. The leopard consumes virtually any animal it can hunt down and catch. Its habitat ranges from rainforest to desert terrains.
In antiquity, it was believed that a leopard was a hybrid of a lion and a panther, as is reflected in its name which is a Greek compound of leon ("lion") and pardos ("male panther"). The Greek word is related to Sanskrit ("snake, tiger, panther"), and probably derives from a Mediterranean language such as Egyptian.
A panther can be any of several species of large felid: the term can refers to cougars and jaguars in the American continents; and everywhere else, to leopards.
The generic component of its modern scientific designation, Panthera pardus, is derived from Latin via Greek pánther. Folk etymology held that it was a compound of pan ("all") ("beast"). However, it is believed instead to derive from an Indo-Iranian word meaning "white-yellow, pale"; in Sanskrit, this word's reflex was , from which was derived ("tiger", among other things), then borrowed into Greek
Like all of the feline family, the Panthera genus has been subject to much alteration and debate, and the exact relations between the four species (as well as the clouded leopard and snow leopard) have not been effectively resolved. It is believed that the basal divergence amongst the Felidae family occurred about 11 million years ago. The last common ancestor of the lion, tiger, leopard, jaguar, snow leopard, and clouded leopard is believed to have occurred about 6.37 million years ago.
Canonical works, such as the third edition of Mammal Species of the World, list the snow leopard as the only species within its genus, Uncia uncia, but more recent research could change this placement. In a mitochondrial DNA study, Yu and Zhang (2005) suggest that the leopard is most closely related to the snow leopard and place the latter as a fifth species of Panthera, P. uncia. Johnson et al. (2006) also support the placement of the snow leopard within Panthera. They suggest, however, that the snow leopard is most closely aligned with the tiger. The leopard is held to have diverged from the Panthera lineage subsequent to these two species, but before the lion and jaguar. Older research has tended to suggest that the leopard is most closely related to the lion and/or the jaguar. As recently as 2001, it was held to have split along with the lion in a phylogenetic analysis of chemical secretions amongst cats.[ The leopard is also considered the type species of the genus Panthera.
Panthera is believed to have emerged in Asia, with ancestors of the leopard and other cats subsequently migrating into Africa. Fossils of early leopard ancestors have been found in East Africa and South Asia from the Pleistocene of 2 to 3.5 Ma. The modern leopard is suggested to have evolved in Africa 470,000–825,000 years ago and radiated across Asia 170,000–300,000 years ago.
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