It's all part of a breeding and conservation programme at the Sanctuary. The two cubs are almost a month old now and being closely looked after by their mother Layla.
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00:00 On the 1st of July, CCTV at the Big Cat Sanctuary captured the birth of two snow leopard cubs,
00:06 now known as Spot and Stripe.
00:08 Extremely excited, the sanctuary have been preparing for this moment for months,
00:13 following a successful ultrasound with mum Leila.
00:16 All of us here at the sanctuary were just over the moon to have our third litter of snow leopard cubs born earlier this month.
00:22 So we are just so, so, so excited.
00:25 Mum Leila is doing a fantastic job of looking after the cubs herself,
00:28 but what we're doing is monitoring them closely via the cameras that we've got set up.
00:32 And then every couple of days what we're doing is we're letting Leila,
00:35 we're shutting Leila out so she can just have some time to herself to get some air, to stretch her legs.
00:39 And that gives us the opportunity to go in, weigh the cubs,
00:43 just give them a check over and make sure they're nice and healthy and growing nicely.
00:46 Whilst only weighing 1kg each, with no teeth or claws to show so far,
00:51 you definitely don't want to bring one of these into your home.
00:54 By the time they're adults, they'll be weighing 40kg with inch-long claws.
00:59 I'm here in the snow leopard hut and this is actually the closest I'm going to get to seeing the cubs.
01:04 Reason being, they're staying indoors until they're fully vaccinated.
01:08 These vaccines, the same that you'd give your domestic cat.
01:11 The Big Cat Sanctuary is part of the European Endangered Species Breeding Programme
01:16 to help create a safe net for endangered species in the wild.
01:19 Snow leopards face significant threats in their natural habitat
01:23 as they are poached for their fur and the illegal medicine trade.
01:26 Snow leopards are classed as vulnerable in the wild, vulnerable to extinction.
01:30 There's thought to be about between 4,000 and 6,000 of them left in the wild.
01:35 And it's even been suggested that that might be an overcount of their population.
01:40 So they are very much at risk of extinction.
01:45 And it's just really important that we take part in this conservation-based breeding programme.
01:51 That's a Europe-wide breeding programme.
01:53 Zoos working together to keep this population healthy and numerous in captivity
01:58 so that if there's a need to reintroduce snow leopards into the wild in the future,
02:02 we'll have the animals to be able to start that process.
02:05 Whilst it's not yet a reality, the sanctuary is looking to the future for rewilding.
02:09 But before this is possible, threats like poachers need to be mitigated
02:13 and areas need to be protected.
02:16 Despite only being almost a month old, spot and stripe are already important assets to the conservation
02:22 and are much adored by everyone around them.
02:25 Cameron Noble for KMTV in Smardon.