<p>A snow leopard tears into a blue sheep in November. The animal waited several hours for the sun to set before consuming its meal.</p>

A snow leopard tears into a blue sheep in November. The animal waited several hours for the sun to set before consuming its meal.

Photograph by Jed Weingarten, Nat Geo Image Collection

Rare Snow Leopard Kills Sheep in First-Ever Photographs

In November, a photographer got quite a shock while trekking the Tibetan Plateau in western China.

The sudden movement caught Jed Weingarten’s eye.

A streak of brown on brown cut through the still, frigid morning on the Tibetan Plateau in China’s Szechuan Province, where the American photographer had been trekking in search of deer and sheep.

He didn't expect to see a snow leopard, but right there in front of him was one of the world’s rarest and most mysterious big cats.

Even more surprising, the predator was rolling a Himalayan blue sheep down a steep, rocky cliff, a strategy that ultimately led to a hard-earned meal. (Read more about snow leopards in National Geographic magazine.)

“I was totally overcome with excitement. It’s so rare and such an opportunity,” says Weingarten, the first photographer to

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