Conservationists are celebrating the rediscovery of flat-headed cats in Thailand after camera traps recorded the endangered feline for the first time in almost 30 years.

Flat-headed cats (Prionailurus planiceps), named after their flattened foreheads, live in fragmented pockets across Brunei, Indonesia and Malaysia, but they were feared extinct in Thailand.

Researchers rediscovered the cats using remote camera traps in Thailand’s Princess Sirindhorn Wildlife Sanctuary in 2024 and 2025 — the first detections in Thailand since 1995. Cat conservation organization Panthera announced the rediscovery on Friday (Dec. 26), which is also Thailand’s annual Wildlife Protection Day.

Flat-headed cats have webbed feet to traverse wetland habitats, such as waterlogged peat-swamp forest, where the species is thought to primarily hunt fish. However, researchers know very little about their lives. The enigmatic cat is the smallest in Southeast Asia, weighing around 4.4 pounds (2 kilograms) — less than a domestic cat — and is scarcely seen by humans.

A small, brown and white cat with very spindly little legs. It is tip toeing through a wet forest floor, and it looks pretty wet and scraggly

It’s so stinkin’ cute!