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ARCHIVED - Iberian lynx and her two kittens killed on Andalucia road
The animals were run over in the Andalusia province of Jaen
The Iberian Society for the Study and Conservation of Ecosystems (SIECE) has called for more stringent protocols after a female lynx was run over on August 26 on a road between the Jaen municipalities of Linares and Vilches. She was killed shortly after two lynx kittens, aged around 5 or 6 months old, were also run over, and experts believe she was out looking for her babies.
The president of SIECE, Francisco Jesus Martin has criticised the “ineffectiveness and lack of coordination” of local authorities after the sighting of the lynx was promptly reported and requests were made to control the traffic to avoid injury both to the animal and to road users.
Sr Martin claimed that having failed to get through to the Guardia Civil phone line, the 112 emergency services were contacted, and although the Vilches Municipal Police travelled to the area where the animal had been spotted, no immediate preventative action was taken.
Next, personnel belonging to the Iberian Lynx conservation project were contacted directly, as they had not previously received any notice from the emergency services.
Sadly, two hours later the death of the animal was confirmed by officials. The female lynx was wearing a GPS tracker but the device hadn’t workedfor some time, although it was later confirmed that she was the mother of the two kittens that had been killed earlier that day. It is believed that a third kitten from the litter escaped unharmed.
The Iberian lynx is included in both the National Catalogue and Andalucían Catalogue of Threatened Species and has been labelled as ‘in danger of extinction’ and SIECE insists that its need for protection is of paramount importance as part of a coordinated project to recover its populations in Spain and Portugal.
Millions of euros has been spent attempting to reintroduce the native Iberian Lynx back into the wild in Spain, the current programme being the Life Lynx Connect programme run by 20 partners including the Andalucian and Castilla-La Mancha regional governments with a budget of more than 18 million euros.
The programme was formerly financed by the EU but funding was stopped in 2019.
The Iberian lynx population in Andalusia now comprises more than 460 specimens currently on the census, mainly in the Doñana-Aljarafe and Sierra Morena areas. Altogether 122 Iberian lynx have been released into the wild in Andalusia, 90 of them from captive breeding centres and the other 32 relocated from other areas. Jaén’s Guarrizas area, where 58 of them were released, is the one to have registered the greatest lynx population growth since reintroductions began in 2010.
There are many obstacles in the smooth progress of this project, the number of animals killed in road accidents and by hunters the biggest issues faced in the re-introduction programme. Significant work has been undertaken to create safe “corridors” to enable the lynx to live in areas divided by major road connections and to ensure work within the hunting community doesn´t bring the animals into conflictive competition over the supply of their principal food source; rabbits.
Saving this magnificent native species from oblivion in the wild is a slow fight against the imprint of humanity, but so much resource is dedicated to making this programme a success, that hopes remain high that the lynx can successfully re-establish sufficient numbers to ensure its survival in the future.
Image: Archive
