To add, the whole concept of subspecies is of course quite vague and iffy to begin with and constantly changes.
For example, until quite recently there were said to be as many as six different living subspecies of tiger – but now the Bengal, Siberian, South China, Indochinese and Malayan tigers have all been lumped into a single subspecies as the Mainland tiger, with only the Sumatran tiger still being recognised as a separate subspecies, now under the name Sunda tiger along with the extinct Bali and Javan tigers.
In a similar way, the African and Asian lions were previously regarded as different subspecies as well, but now they are instead divided into a northern subspecies which covers Asia and northern and western Africa, and a southern subspecies that covers eastern and southern Africa.
So it is very possible that the subspecies of the cheetah will be reclassified as well in the near future, especially since alls cheetah populations seem to very closely related from having gone through quite recent population bottlenecks.
Malthesse t1_je8y7q6 wrote
Reply to comment by thethpunjabi in First cheetah cubs born in India since extinction 70 years ago by thethpunjabi
To add, the whole concept of subspecies is of course quite vague and iffy to begin with and constantly changes.
For example, until quite recently there were said to be as many as six different living subspecies of tiger – but now the Bengal, Siberian, South China, Indochinese and Malayan tigers have all been lumped into a single subspecies as the Mainland tiger, with only the Sumatran tiger still being recognised as a separate subspecies, now under the name Sunda tiger along with the extinct Bali and Javan tigers.
In a similar way, the African and Asian lions were previously regarded as different subspecies as well, but now they are instead divided into a northern subspecies which covers Asia and northern and western Africa, and a southern subspecies that covers eastern and southern Africa.
So it is very possible that the subspecies of the cheetah will be reclassified as well in the near future, especially since alls cheetah populations seem to very closely related from having gone through quite recent population bottlenecks.