The Iberian lynx is the most vulnerable cat in the world. Iberian lynx - description, habitat, lifestyle Lifestyle and nutrition of the Iberian lynx

The Iberian lynx is thought to be descended from the great cave lynx, a 30kg feline that roamed Europe approximately 100,000 years ago. Paleontologists believe that the Pleistocene ice ages led to the isolation of one group of cave cats; the natural boundaries of its habitat were the northern ice, on the one hand, and the Mediterranean Sea, on the other. The same reasons contributed to the evolution of a new species of lagomorphs; he became the predecessor of the animals we now call wild rabbits. It is not surprising that as a result of natural selection, when switching to a smaller type of food in new conditions, the size of the cave lynx decreased and it began to have camouflage spots on its skin. The acquisition of new qualities reduced the competition of the Iberian lynx with the common lynx - the largest species of modern lynx that came to Europe from Asia. The small Iberian lynx feeds on rabbits, while the common lynx preys on roe deer and chamois.

Archaeological sites throughout the Iberian Peninsula and southern France have yielded numerous remains of Iberian lynxes (and their prey rabbits), suggesting that humans began exterminating these cats very early on for their skins and meat. The species' range has been steadily declining as Mediterranean forests have given way to arable land, grazing lands and artificial forests. However, in the first half of the 20th century, lynxes still flourished in the southern part of their former range, although there were fewer and fewer of them in the north.

By the beginning of the 20th century, the Iberian lynx population survived only in the mountainous regions of the southwest of the Iberian Peninsula. Two factors could hasten the extinction of this population, already greatly reduced. First, the Spanish government supported the systematic extermination of lynxes. The situation worsened after myxomatosis was introduced from France, wiping out entire populations of rabbits. Although the Iberian lynx was brought under legal protection in Spain and Portugal in 1974, its numbers did not increase as the lynxes were caught in snares and traps intended for other animals. Lynxes are now found in less than 2% of all rural areas in Spain (down from 11% in 1960). Small populations are distributed over approximately 10 points, isolated from each other. The total number of the species does not exceed 600 individuals.

The IUCN considers the Iberian lynx to be the most endangered feline species in the world, and it is likely that these cats will disappear forever from our planet in the first decades of the 21st century. European conservationists are doing everything possible to prevent their extinction.

- a mammal of prey that belongs to the family felines. This species has another name - “ Spanish lynx". This lynx is the rarest cat on the planet. She needs saving from people. These beautiful animals are no longer in the wild, because in order to preserve them, half of the small population was transported to Doñana, a Spanish national park. Therefore, they are considered an endangered species of animals.
If we compare the Eurasian and Iberian lynx, the size of the latter is not very large. It grows up to a meter in length, its height at the shoulders is about 70 cm, and its weight is only 13 kg.
In their lifestyle, these rare animals are not much different from their own kind. They prefer to live alone. They change their habit only during the mating season. Only the female takes part in raising the young. A cat can give birth to a maximum of 4 kittens at one time. Babies need their mother for the first five months, drinking milk from her breast. This is despite the fact that a month after birth, babies can eat regular food. They go hunting on their own at the age of 10 months, but are under the supervision of their mother for 20 months. At the age of 2 years, they are no longer dependent on their mother and independently find their own territory to live. In freedom, lynxes can live about 13 years, and in captivity - about 20.

At the beginning of the last century, the Spanish lynx lived in other territories, not only in Spain, but also in Portugal. If you believe the statistics, the number of these animals is about two hundred individuals. Half of them are scattered across different zoos around the world, which are already creating special lynx breeding programs. Of course, information about the Iberian cat is in the International Red Book and I CITES. The World Organization for Animal Conservation has banned various types of hunting and moved the lynxes to a reserve that has a strict visiting schedule.
In the case of the Iberian lynx, it was not the human factor that played the main role in their fate. Many people know that lynxes eat hares and rabbits. And the latter are by nature sensitive to their habitat and their conditions. In recent years, natural conditions have become unacceptable for them, so these long-eared rodents cannot live in new conditions. As a result of this, their numbers are reduced, and subsequently the number of predatory cats is also reduced.
In addition, not only hares and rabbits suffer from the lack of normal natural conditions, but also the lynxes themselves. These cats use fallen cork oak trees for shelter. And in Europe there are very few of these trees, so they simply have nowhere to exist.

The Iberian (Spanish, Sardinian) lynx is externally similar to its close relatives - the common lynx, Canadian and red. Although it is smaller in size. So, height is 50-70 centimeters, length - from 80 centimeters to 1 meter, tail with a black tip - from 15 to 30 centimeters. Males, as usual, are larger than females, weighing on average 13-14 kilograms (although there are individuals reaching 25 kg). Females are lighter - 9.5-10 kilograms.

The skull is shorter than that of the common lynx, the muzzle is flat and narrow, and the jaws are quite long. But the fangs are smaller than those of cats that hunt large animals. This structure of the skull and muzzle allows you to easily catch small, fast prey and kill it instantly.

The ears are decorated with black tassels, the cheeks are framed by dark sideburns, which is why the animals look like they have beards. The fur is short - after all, where the Iberian lynx lives, it is warm, it is yellow-brown in color. The entire surface of the body (including the paws) is decorated with dark spots of various shapes and sizes. The coloring is very similar to leopard print.

Habitat

The Iberian lynx lives on the Iberian Peninsula, in the southwestern regions of Spain and almost the entire territory of Portugal. Not so long ago (in the 19th century), the animal completely occupied Spanish and Portuguese territories, but their numbers have greatly decreased. Now the main part lives in the Coto de Doñana National Reserve.

Habitat

Reproduction

Kittens already eat raw meat in the second month of life, but their mother feeds them milk for up to five months. At six months, young lynx cubs begin to hunt on their own, but until they completely decide on a hunting area (at about 20 months), they remain to live with their mother.

Nutrition

The structure of the skull and jaws allows the lynx to catch small animals with dexterity. Their small size combined with camouflage makes them excellent hunters of small mammals.

The Iberian lynx is a solitary hunter; its diet is based on rabbits. For an adult animal, you need to eat at least one carcass per day. Hares and various kinds of rodents, snakes, and birds also appear as prey. The Iberian lynx catches fish in reservoirs and can grab and eat a gaping insect. It happens that the prey turns out to be a baby fallow deer, deer or mouflon.

Possessing excellent eyesight and sense of smell, most often the lynx freezes on a tree branch or in the shelter of rocks and waits for the approach of the prey, which it then attacks. The spotted hunter does not immediately eat the prey - he first takes it away and only then starts eating. If it is not possible to cope with all the prey, then it hides and is eaten for tomorrow.

Lifestyle, behavior

The Iberian lynx is a predator that lives a solitary life. They are active at dusk and are directly dependent on the activity of the prey - the Iberian rabbit. In winter, when the rabbit lives during the day, the lynx also switches to the same regime.

Each animal has its own territory, for males it is up to 18 square kilometers, for females it is smaller - up to 10. Their territories overlap, each sex protects its territory from strangers and potential threats. Lynxes mark the boundaries of areas with the help of smells - they mark with urine or excrement, and leave scratches on trees.

If there is little food in the domain, the lynxes show aggression and kill other animals, seeing them as competitors. Their victims include foxes, otters, ordinary dogs, and mongooses.

Threats

Since the Iberian lynx occupies one of the top lines in the food chain, they have no natural enemies. The only one who can be considered an enemy is man. Most of the Spanish lynx were killed for the sake of their beautiful fur, and currently only two percent of the number that existed in the 19th century remains.

Role in the ecological system

Security status

The Iberian lynx is a species of rapidly disappearing mammal. If at the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries there were more than one hundred thousand specimens, then by the middle of the 20th there were just over 3 thousand left, and by the beginning of the 21st century - only four hundred animals. This animal is included not only in the Red Book, but also in various lists and conventions dedicated to endangered animals.

A special program has been created for breeding lynx in captivity, which will make it possible to restore the population.

The Spanish lynx is one of the rarest mammals on Earth. Only about 140 animals remain in the wild. At the beginning of the 20th century. The Spanish lynx was a quite common species and the population size was estimated at about 100 thousand individuals. Why did such sad events happen? First, the population of the European rabbit, which is the main game of lynx, has been greatly reduced as a result of infections. Secondly, due to the uncontrolled shooting of lynxes, most of the adults could not take part in breeding, and the kittens died, left without the protection of their parents. The general change in the natural environment, urbanization, and intensive agricultural activity all played a role. The fact remains: without special conservation measures, the Spanish lynx will disappear from the wild in the near future.

Previously, the Spanish lynx was considered a subspecies of the common lynx; it was identified as a separate species relatively recently. Today it has been proven that these are two separate species.

WHERE DOES IT LIVE?

The Spanish lynx is found exclusively in the southwest, where only two populations exist, isolated from each other. This factor makes the species even more vulnerable: a much smaller number of individuals participate in the reproduction of the species. In former times, the Spanish lynx was quite widespread on the Iberian Peninsula. Today the species is considered extinct for the territory. Unlike the European lynx, which lives in the forest zone, the Iberian lynx prefers bushes.

HOW TO FIND OUT

The lynx has a small, graceful body, a neat muzzle, ears with beautiful dark tufts and a short tail. Body length ranges from 85 to 110 cm, and the average weight is 12-15 kg. It is smaller in size than its closest relative, the common lynx. The fur is covered with dark spots, which makes it look like a leopard, and is shorter compared to other types of lynx. Since the animal lives in warm latitudes, there is no need for long hair with a thick undercoat.

LIFESTYLE AND BIOLOGY

Like all predators, the lynx is highly dependent on its food source. The size of its individual range (ranging from 10-20 km2) also varies, depending on how much prey is available on it. The latter also depends on competitors for food among relatives - primarily the red fox and the Egyptian mongoose. The main prey of the lynx are rabbits and hares. Only sometimes does it attack young deer.

During the mating season, the female “forgets” that she is a territorial predator, leaves her area and goes in search of a male. Pregnancy lasts about two months, babies are born in March - September. There are usually two or three kittens in a litter. The weight of a newborn lynx cub is only 200-250 g. At the age of 7 to 10 months, babies become completely independent, but are in no hurry to leave their mother forever. As a rule, they stay with her for another 10-12 months, and then go in search of individual sites. In captivity, Spanish lynxes reach sexual maturity at one year of age. In the wild, everything is different. Here, lynx cubs go through a longer period of growing up and are heavily dependent on the hunting skills received from their mother. There is a known case when a female lynx, who lost her mother at an early age, gave birth to kittens only at five years old. Probably, animals understand with their natural instinct that, without being able to obtain the necessary food, they cannot reproduce. The maximum life expectancy is 13 years.

Spanish lynx kittens aged one to two months show increased aggression towards each other: growling, biting and fighting. Moreover, these are not just “brotherly games”, as is the case with other types of cats. As a result of such skirmishes, the younger and weaker lynx often dies. Therefore, today one of the possible ways to preserve the species is to isolate babies from each other.

BRIEF CHARACTERISTICS

Kingdom: Animalia.
Phylum: Chordata.
Class: Mammals (Mammalia).
Order: Carnivora (Carnivora).
Family: Felidae.
Genus: Lynx (Lynx).
Species: Spanish lynx (Lynx pardinus).

The Iberian lynx or Iberian lynx belongs to the lynx genus of the cat family. Endangered. Until the mid-19th century, it lived throughout the Iberian Peninsula. Currently, it is found only in certain areas in southern Spain in Andalusia. It prefers to live among meadows and arable lands located near bushes and wooded areas. But given the small number, it is found mainly in mountainous areas and occasionally in lowland forests.

Ears with tufts, long legs, short tail. Its length is 15-30 cm. On the lower jaw the fur is long and resembles a beard. The muzzle is narrow, the jaws are elongated, and the fangs are small. The color of the fur is yellowish-brown and is diluted with dark spots. The body length is 85-110 cm. The height at the withers is 60-70 cm. Males are larger than females. Their weight varies from 13 to 26 kg. Females weigh on average 10 kg.

Reproduction and lifespan

Pregnancy lasts about 2 months. Kittens are born from March to September. The peak birth rate occurs in March-April. There are usually 2-3 kittens in a litter. There is a maximum of 5 kittens. Newborns weigh 200-250 grams. The young become independent at 7-9 months, but remain with their mother until 20 months. Sexual maturity occurs at the age of 1 year.

When kittens reach 2 months of age, they begin to show aggression towards each other. Sometimes even one kitten kills another. Experts believe that attacks of aggression are associated with the transition from mother's milk to meat. In the wild, the Iberian lynx lives a maximum of 13 years.

Behavior and nutrition

This predatory cat is active at dusk and at night. Leads a solitary lifestyle. The prey usually lies in wait in the bushes, and when the prey approaches within a few steps, the lynx rushes at it. Each individual has its own territory, which ranges from 5 to 20 square meters. km. Boundaries are marked by urine, excrement and scratches on tree bark.

Hunting is carried out for small animals. The main diet consists of hares and rabbits (75% of all food). One rabbit per day is enough for a predator. In addition, rodents, birds, reptiles, and insects are eaten. Sometimes the predatory cat hunts young fallow deer and roe deer.

Number

The number of the species has decreased by 80% over the past 20 years. In 2005, there were no more than 100 Iberian lynxes, and in 1960 there were 4 thousand. Today, there is a program for breeding these cats in captivity. Spain plans to organize a special center where representatives of the species will be bred. They want to create a similar center in Portugal. In captivity, cats breed and the cubs survive. This practice has taken place since 2002.