During November-December 2015, the Persian Leopard Project in Northeastern Iran was busy with intensive camera trapping survey of Sarigol and Salouk National Parks, both in North Khorasan province. The team is aiming to provide the first reliable population estimation of the Endangered Persian leopards in these two reserves.
Besides several photos of Persian leopards, the project’s camera traps have captured several photos of the rich biodiversity of these reserves, including members of the guild of large carnivores and mountain ungulates. The team has now started to analyze the data.
Led by ICS researcher Mohammad Farhadinia, the Persian Leopard Project is collaborative study between University of Oxford’s WildCRU, Iranian Cheetah Society, Iran Department of Environment, provincial offices of Iran DoE in North Khorasan and Razavi Khorasan, and Panthera. The project aims to answer a number of conservation-based questions about the persistence of the Endangered Persian leopard on human-dominated landscapes in northeastern Iran.