Posted on
23 September 2009 - Sochi, Russia: Two leopards
from Ashkhabad, Turkmenistan are recovering
after a long flight and car ride to their
new homes in a Russian national park, as
part of efforts to reintroduce the species
into the Caucasus region.
The leopards were moved
into spacious pens in Sochi National Park
in southwestern Russia as part of a species
reintroduction programme implemented by
WWF and the Russian government.
They travelled more
than 1,000 kilometers by plane and then
by car, and are in good health despite the
long trip and the effects of anaesthetic.
Upon arrival, the leopards
were met by WWF, park staff and Russian
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in Sochi on
Saturday and then released into large pens
inside a special centre created for them
in the park.
The big cats (Panthera
pardus saxicolor) will take part in the
Programme for Persian Leopard Reintroduction,
developed by experts from WWF and the Russian
Academy of Natural Sciences, and approved
by the Russian Ministry of Natural Resources
and Ecology.
“There are very few
leopards in the whole of Caucasus, only
a few dozen,” said Igor Chestin, WWF-Russia
CEO. “They exist with the help of some inflow
from Iran, which has several hundreds remaining.
We want to create a new, Northern-based
nucleus of the population, so that together
with the Southern nucleus in Iran it can
guarantee sustainability for the leopard
population both in the Russian Caucasus
and neighboring countries.”
The leopards are already
actively moving around. They drink a lot
of water, which is normal after anaesthesia,
and on Sunday one of them ate a slab of
meat given to him by veterinarians. Both
leopards are males.
“They will have time
to adapt to the new conditions and start
to feel ownership of the territory by the
time females arrive ”, said Umar Semyonov,
deputy director of the Sochi national park.
“And it will be easier for females to adapt
with support from males.”
The leopards from Turkmenistan
will live in the Centre for breeding and
rehabilitation in the Sochi national park.
Only their descendants will be released
into the wild in the Caucasus strict nature
reserve.
“Areas for future release
were carefully chosen to resemble as much
as possible leopards’ habitat in Turkmenistan,
both in terms of relief and prey,” said
Professor Anatoly Kudaktin, programme scientific
supervisor. “Conditions in the Caucasus
will be even more comfortable in some ways
than in Turkmenistan, and ungulate density
is higher here.”
These types of leopards
are endangered because most of their habitat
was lost in the last century due to transformation.
Migration routes between remaining isolated
populations are cut off due to infrastructure
development, which has led to small fragmented
populations that cannot easily breed.
Financially, the Programme
is supported by WWF-Russia, “Rosa Khutor”
Company, VympelCom Group, and Russian government.
