Leopard (<i>Panthera pardus</i>) reoccupying its historic range in the South Caucasus: a first evidence (Mammalia: Felidae)

Askerov, Elshad; Talibov, Tariel; Manvelyan, Karen; Zazanashvili, Nugzar; Fatullayev, Parviz; Malkhasyan, Alexander

doi:10.1080/09397140.2018.1552349

Cited by 6 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 2 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…For leopards that move freely across international borders in Asia, the same individuals may be counted in more than one country, inflating abundance estimates (Bischof et al, 2016; Vitkalova et al, 2018). This may be a problem in the Caucasus and along the Russia–China border (Vitkalova et al, 2018; Askerov et al, 2019). This emphasizes the need for the establishment of internationally managed monitoring programmes and for sharing monitoring information.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The concept of international Peace Parks is being promoted as a way of linking biodiversity conservation with national security (McNeely, 2003), and such a park has been established between Arevik National Park in Armenia and Dizmar Protected Area in Iran, where leopards occur. In addition to the two existing transboundary leopard initiatives in the Caucasus and Russia–China borderlands (Vitkalova et al, 2018; Askerov et al, 2019), we identified three key transboundary landscapes: (1) Kopet Dag ecoregion along the Iran–Turkmenistan border for the Persian leopard, although some parts contain impassable fences (Fig. 2), (2) Northern Tenasserim Forest Complex along the Thailand–Myanmar border for the Indochinese leopard, one of WWF's five priority global landscapes (WWF, 2019), and (3) Hawf–Dhofar Mountains along the Yemen–Oman border for the Arabian leopard.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Given that the majority of borderland leopard populations occur along unfenced international borders, conflicting countries can unilaterally enforce the conservation of their transboundary populations and shift their conservation investments towards the borderland. An example is leopard conservation in Armenia and Azerbaijan's Nakhichevan Republic which, despite a political dispute, has succeeded in maintaining protected areas for leopards and supporting population recovery on both sides of the shared border (Askerov et al, 2019).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…1, Table 2), with small populations of generally < 10 individuals (Askerov et al, 2015; Avgan et al, 2016). These appear to be sink populations on the brink of extinction (Askerov et al, 2015; Avgan et al, 2016; Stein et al, 2016; Maharramova et al, 2018), although under intensive conservation efforts they are able to recolonize suitable habitats (Askerov et al, 2019).

Fig.…”

Section: Transboundary Rangesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In Asia, leopard subspecies currently occur in < 16% of their historical range, with the only relatively large populations (400–500 individuals) occurring in India, Sri Lanka and Iran (Jacobson et al, 2016; Stein et al, 2016). Persistence of many small populations of leopards is dependent on source–sink dynamics across international borders (Khorozyan et al, 2014; Farhadinia et al, 2015; Rostro-García et al, 2016; Feng et al, 2017; Maharramova et al, 2018; Askerov et al, 2019).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 4 more Smart Citations

Big cats in borderlands: challenges and implications for transboundary conservation of Asian leopards

Farhadinia

Rostro‐García

Feng

et al. 2020

Oryx

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Large carnivores have extensive spatial requirements, with ranges that often span geopolitical borders. Consequently, management of transboundary populations is subject to several political jurisdictions, often with heterogeneity in conservation challenges. In continental Asia there are four threatened leopard subspecies with transboundary populations spanning 23 countries: the Persian Panthera pardus saxicolor, Indochinese P. pardus delacouri, Arabian P. pardus nimr and Amur P. pardus orientalis leopards. We reviewed the status of these subspecies and examined the challenges to, and opportunities for, their conservation. The Amur and Indochinese leopards have the majority (58–100%) of their remaining range in borderlands, and the Persian and Arabian leopards have 23–26% of their remaining ranges in borderlands. Overall, in 18 of 23 countries the majority of the remaining leopard range is in borderlands, and thus in most countries conservation of these subspecies is dependent on transboundary collaboration. However, we found only two transboundary initiatives for Asian leopards. Overall, we highlighted three key transboundary landscapes in regions that are of high importance for the survival of these subspecies. Recent listing of the leopard in the Bonn Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals is important, but more international collaboration is needed to conserve these subspecies. We provide a spatial framework with which range countries and international agencies could establish transboundary cooperation for conserving threatened leopards in Asia.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fig.…”

Section: Transboundary Rangesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Big cats in borderlands: challenges and implications for transboundary conservation of Asian leopards

Farhadinia

Rostro‐García

Feng

et al. 2020

Oryx

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

Reducing persecution is more effective for restoring large carnivores than restoring their prey

Bleyhl

Ghoddousi

Askerov

et al. 2021

Ecological Applications

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Large carnivores are currently disappearing from many world regions because of habitat loss, prey depletion, and persecution. Ensuring large carnivore persistence requires safeguarding and sometimes facilitating the expansion of their populations. Understanding which conservation strategies, such as reducing persecution or restoring prey, are most effective to help carnivores to reclaim their former ranges is therefore important. Here, we systematically explored such alternative strategies for the endangered Persian leopard (Panthera pardus saxicolor) in the Caucasus. We combined a rule‐based habitat suitability map and a spatially explicit leopard population model to identify potential leopard subpopulations (i.e., breeding patches), and to test the effect of different levels of persecution reduction and prey restoration on leopard population viability across the entire Caucasus ecoregion and northern Iran (about 737,000 km2). We identified substantial areas of potentially suitable leopard habitat (~120,000 km2), most of which is currently unoccupied. Our model revealed that leopards could potentially recolonize these patches and increase to a population of >1,000 individuals in 100 yr, but only in scenarios of medium to high persecution reduction and prey restoration. Overall, reducing persecution had a more pronounced effect on leopard metapopulation viability than prey restoration: Without conservation strategies to reduce persecution, leopards went extinct from the Caucasus in all scenarios tested. Our study highlights the importance of persecution reduction in small populations, which should hence be prioritized when resources for conservation are limited. We show how individual‐based, spatially explicit metapopulation models can help in quantifying the recolonization potential of large carnivores in unoccupied habitat, designing adequate conservation strategies to foster such recolonizations, and anticipating the long‐term prospects of carnivore populations under alternative scenarios. Our study also outlines how data scarcity, which is typical for threatened range‐expanding species, can be overcome with a rule‐based habitat map. For Persian leopards, our projections clearly suggest that there is a large potential for a viable metapopulation in the Caucasus, but only if major conservation actions are taken towards reducing persecution and restoring prey.

show abstract

Determinants of livestock depredation risk by Persian leopards in southern Iran

Khosravi,

Julaie,

Fandos

et al. 2024

Biological Conservation

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Leopard (Panthera pardus) reoccupying its historic range in the South Caucasus: a first evidence (Mammalia: Felidae)

Cited by 6 publications

References 2 publications

Big cats in borderlands: challenges and implications for transboundary conservation of Asian leopards

Big cats in borderlands: challenges and implications for transboundary conservation of Asian leopards

Reducing persecution is more effective for restoring large carnivores than restoring their prey

Determinants of livestock depredation risk by Persian leopards in southern Iran

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About