Martes zibellina

Sables are small to medium-sized mammals with 19 subspecies.

Sables are good at climbing trees, are agile and nimble, and live deep in the forest. They build nests in rock cracks, tree holes and under tree roots; they usually live in settled areas, but they often wander and migrate due to the abundance of food and climate change, and they often live in simple temporary nests for rest. Except for the mating period, they mostly live alone; they have sharp vision and hearing, and they move quickly. Once disturbed, they disappear into the woods in an instant. They can move and forage during the day and night, but mostly at night. When food is scarce, they also come out to hunt during the day, and their activity range is within 5-10 square kilometers. They mostly catch prey on the ground and are very flexible in climbing trees. When food is scarce in winter, they migrate to low mountain areas and return when the weather warms up.

The sable's gait when moving on the ground mainly includes small steps and running and jumping steps. When moving, they always run and stop, smell and look, and sometimes look around with their heads raised. When hunting and avoiding enemies, it runs and jumps, and its vertical jump can generally reach about 30 cm. Some people also believe that it can jump up to 2 meters. Its footprints are a deep pit in the deep snow, and clear claw marks can be seen on the ice surface slightly covered with snow.

Today, the artificial breeding industry of sables has been relatively developed, and according to people's different needs, humans have also cultivated sables with different colors of fur, such as: black sable, blue sable, white sable, yellow sable, etc. And sable fur is also listed as one of the three treasures of Northeast China together with ginseng and deer antlers. The quality of sable fur, especially winter fur, is so high that it has the reputation of "King of Fur", which is not a good thing for sables.

Listed in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species in 2016 ver 3.1 - Least Concern (LC).

China's Red Book of Endangered Animals: Endangered.

Listed in China's National Key Protected Wildlife List (February 5, 2021) Level 1.

Protect wildlife and eliminate game.

Maintaining ecological balance is everyone's responsibility!

Distributed in China, Finland, Japan (Hokkaido), South Korea, North Korea, Mongolia, Poland, and the Russian Federation.
In China, it is only found in the Greater Khingan Range, Lesser Khingan Range, Laoye Range, Zhangguangcai Range, Wanda Mountain in Heilongjiang, Changbai Mountain in Jilin, Huanren County in Liaoning, and the Altai Mountains in northern Xinjiang, with a discontinuous distribution.
Sables mainly live in the cold subarctic coniferous forests and mixed coniferous and broad-leaved forests at an altitude of 800-1600 meters, located north of 41° north latitude.

The body is slender, the limbs are short and strong, the hind limbs are slightly longer than the front limbs, both the front and rear limbs have five toes, and also have fleshy pads. The curved claws are semi-retractable and very sharp. Very suitable for climbing trees. The ears are large and upright, slightly triangular, and layered behind the ear edges. The eyes are large and bright, and the tail is thick and fluffy, accounting for about 30-40% of the body length. The tail hair is fluffy.
The wild sable is brown or brown all over (domestic sables are black, white, blue, yellow, etc.); slightly mixed with white needle hair; the head is light gray-brown, the ear edges are dirty white, with yellow or yellow-white throat spots; the chin is brown with orange-yellow hair; the chest has brown hair, and the abdomen is light. The winter hair is dense and thick, the whole body hair is brown, the chest, abdomen and sides of the body are the same color, and white needle hair is scattered all