Home ranges and temporal land tenure of Sunda clouded leopards (Neofelis diardi subsp.borneensis) in Indonesian Borneo

Little is known about the spatial ecology of the Sunda clouded leopard (Neofelis diardi). Being rare and elusive rainforest dwellers, studying them is difficult. Basic knowledge on their home ranges and social organization is lacking, yet is crucial for maintaining viable populations in protected areas, in the scope of this Vulnerable species’ conservation. This study uses 10 years’ worth of camera trap photo-captures to estimate home range size and overlap (both intra- and intersexual) in a tropical peat swamp forest in Central Kalimantan, Indonesian Borneo. Home ranges were estimated using minimum convex polygons (MCPs) and fixed kernel utilization densities (KUDs). Over this period, 12 individual clouded leopards were identified (male/female/unknown: 8/1/3) from a total of 157 independent photo-captures. Home ranges could only be calculated for 6 males that had been recaptured at a minimum of 5 different camera stations. For these males, the 50%, 95%, and 100% MCPs averaged 0.7 km2, 2.2 km2, and 6.2 km2, respectively. The 50% and 95% KUDs averaged 7.7 km2 and 35.3 km2, respectively. All home ranges overlapped significantly. The simultaneous use of an area and lack of exclusivity points towards a shared space use with mutual temporal avoidance for male clouded leopards. This is valuable information, as it would allow smaller protected areas to sustain viable clouded leopard populations, especially considering the felid’s rapidly declining habitat. The present study also hints at the potential of camera trap surveys for home range studies, although seemingly only in combination with KUDs, since our MCP results seem to be ecologically unrepresentative. This combination of methods should be investigated further, as it might provide us with valuable information for rare and elusive species. (Less)