Final answer:
Amur leopards likely take longer to raise their young due to environmental pressures, a need for extensive parental care with fewer offspring, and potentially harsher climates requiring a longer dependency period compared to African leopards.
Step-by-step explanation:
The reason it takes longer for Amur leopards to raise their young as opposed to African leopards likely has to do with environmental pressures and the need for more extended parental care due to fewer offspring. In species that have few offspring during a reproductive event, such as wolves and leopards, these offspring often need considerable care and development time to reach self-sufficiency. This phenomenon is observed in other mammals, like humans and kangaroos, where the young are born quite helpless and need significant parental investment before they can survive on their own.
Furthermore, the environmental conditions where Amur leopards live, in the temperate forests of the Russian Far East, might require a longer dependency period due to harsher climates, as compared to the savannas where African leopards are found. Smaller or isolated populations, as in the case of the Amur leopard, may also lead to different social structures and survival strategies, potentially influencing the length of time needed for nurturing young. Hence, Amur leopards possibly invest more in raising each individual offspring to ensure their survival in a challenging environment.