Panthera, in collaboration with Snow Leopard Trust (SLT), Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), and the Snow Leopard Network, co-hosted an international conference on Range-wide Conservation Planning for Snow Leopards in Beijing, China in March 2008. Leading snow leopard conservationists and researchers, as well as government officials from 11 of 12 snow leopard range countries, were among the more than 100 conference attendees. One of the most significant outputs of the conference was an updated knowledge-based map of snow leopard habitat, which identifies critical conservation units within the cat’s range. This map, coupled with key country-specific actions identified by each range state, will allow Panthera to effectively focus its snow leopard conservation program.
Read Panthera's Snow Leopard Report Card: The State of the Snow Leopard.
Panthera will take a multi-faceted approach in its snow leopard program, including rigorous scientific research, development and dissemination of improved methods to monitor snow leopard and prey populations, followed by planning and implementing conservation actions at the local, national and international levels.
The following are considered priority actions in the early phases of our snow leopard program:
Researching a mysterious cat
Numerous anthropogenic threats to the long-term persistence of snow leopards yield an urgent need to ensure that effective conservation strategies are in place. However, a thorough understanding of the species’ ecology, behavior and habitat requirements is required to design and implement effective programs, and this information can only be gained through sound scientific investigation. Snow leopards are highly cryptic and occupy remote inaccessible habitat, making research extremely difficult, hence, the knowledge required for conservation is lacking. Despite studies dating back to the early 1980s, most questions regarding the basic life history of snow leopards remain unanswered. Essential knowledge on habitat use, home-range size, activity patterns, and daily or seasonal movements is deficient and sometimes conflicting. To meet these critical information needs, Panthera will collaborate with the SLT, Felidae Conservation Fund, the Mongolian Ministry of Nature and Environment, and WCS on the first ever long-term comprehensive study of the species. The study was initiated in summer 2008 in Mongolia’s South Gobi province.
Developing new research methods
Without a statistically-reliable way to estimate population size or trends over time, it is difficult to assess the impact of conservation programs on snow leopards, make decisions regarding the allocation of scarce resources, or modify conservation strategies to achieve desired outcomes. Many measures of relative abundance, such as sign density, have proven unreliable for assessing population size and trends or making comparisons across sites. Several ‘non-invasive’ field methods, including fecal genetics, camera trapping and occupancy modeling using presence-absence surveys, all hold promise as effective tools for estimating population size of rare and elusive species such as snow leopards.
Panthera will support and participate in further development and testing of these methodologies in collaboration with its partners. When best practices have been identified we will support distribution of the methods through training, and by fostering data sharing across the range.
Strategies for conservation
In 2002, snow leopard conservationists and researchers from around the world came together to establish a Snow Leopard Survival Strategy (SLSS) that would ensure the species long-term persistence in the wild. An additional output of that effort was the creation of the Snow Leopard Network (SLN), a global consortium of more than 200 professionals dedicated to the study and conservation of the species. The SLSS has served as a guiding document for establishment of national snow leopard conservation action plans, as exemplified in India, Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Bhutan, and for regional action plans for the Eastern Himalaya and Tien Shan. Panthera will further such conservation planning through support of SLN activities and initiatives wherever appropriate. Additionally, the outputs of 2008 Beijing Range-wide Conservation Planning Conference will be brought to bear as action plans move to the implementation phase, which Panthera will aggressively pursue through collaboration with range-state governments.
Panthera’s snow leopard program is the newest undertaking of the organization, but we envision substantial growth in this field in coming years, ensuring demonstrable impacts on the conservation of this magnificent species.
