Since April 2021, Claratal and the Auas Oanob Conservancy hosts and supports a research project focused on leopards and run by the the Carnivore Ecology Lab at the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia and the IZW Cheetah Research Project of the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research of Berlin.

The project named InterMuc (https://intermuc.splet.arnes.si/) aims to improve our understanding of inter-specific and intra-specific interactions among felids (Leopards and Cheetahs), as well as to gain novel insights into several other aspects of their ecology.

Ruben Portas, one of the researchers is currently based on Claratal. He is capturing and fitting leopards with GPS-collars to closely track their movements. This will help him and his team to understand which leopards (and cheetahs) avoid each other and which are attracted to each other and why. At the same time, GPS data allows them to find locations that they use for scent-marking and locations where they kill their prey.

Our guests may have the possibility to join Ruben in the field and experience wildlife research in the ground conducted on Claratal, either checking leopard kill-sites or maintaining camera traps and box-traps for the capture of leopards.

Please contact us if you are interested to be part of the research!

Read more on the InterMuc website:
https://intermuc.splet.arnes.si/

Field work:

Some images from the camera traps: