Big cats, big cities: how Los Angeles and Mumbai live cheek by jowl with feline locals

The two megacities are the only ones in the world where large carnivores thrive as the urban areas have encroached on natural habitats

Los Angeles and Mumbai, India, share many superlatives as pinnacles of cinema, fashion and traffic congestion. But another similarity lurks in the shadows, most often seen at night walking silently on four paws.

These metropolises are the world’s only megacities of 10 million-plus where large felines – mountain lions in one, leopards in the other – thrive by breeding, hunting and maintaining territory within urban boundaries.