Population Status
Global: Category 3(A)
Regional: Category 2(A)
IUCN: Not Listed
The Amazon basin rainforest, some 6 million km2
in extent (Collins 1990), is the key stronghold of the species, and densities may be as
high as one resident per 15 km2, as estimated for
jaguars in Belize (Rabinowitz 1991). This refuge is of sufficient size and integrity to
conserve the species in large numbers for well into the forseeable future, even if densities are
lower than in Belize. However, the jaguar is declining in most other habitats
(Figure 3). It has been virtually eliminated from
much of the drier northern parts of its range in the US and Mexico (Brown 1991), as
well as the pampas scrub grasslands of Argentina and throughout Uruguay (Swank and Teer
1987). The species has probably already lost significant elements of its intraspecific diversity,
and the trend continues. While commercial exploitation for their skins is no longer a factor, jaguars
still face local extirpation at the hands of cattle ranchers.
The status of several key large jaguar populations is discussed in detail below.
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Yucatan peninsula\northern Guatemala\Belize:
Rabinowitz and Nottingham (1986), working in the Cockscomb Basin of Belize, found
male home ranges to average 33 km2 (range
28-40 km2; n=4) and females a minimum of 10
km2 (n=3). There was partial overlap of male
ranges, no overlap of female ranges, and male ranges entirely encompassed those of females. Based on
a mean density of one resident adult jaguar per 15 km2,
and taking land and hunting pressures into account, Rabinowitz (1991a) estimated Belize’s
population to number between 600 to 1,000. Based on density estimates (derived from footprints) of
one jaguar per 26-32 km2 in Mexico’s Calakmul
Biosphere Reserve, Aranda (1990) estimated a population of 125-180 jaguars for the 4,000
km2 reserve, and 465-550 jaguars in an adjoining 15,000
km2 of wilderness area in Petén, northern
Guatemala - which has since been protected as the Maya Biosphere Reserve.
Chiapas state, Mexico:
Aranda (in press) estimated 350+65 jaguars (based on a range of habitat-specific densities
from one animal per 15-40 km2) in the state,
concentrated in four major populations occupying a total of 8,800
km2.
The Pantanal:
The Pantanal is the largest seasonally flooded land area in the world (Alho et al. 1988),
extending over 100,000 km2 on the borders of
Brazil, Bolivia and Paraguay. Wet savanna woodland such as this and the Venezuelan llanos may
represent optimal jaguar habitat, judging by the larger average sizes attained by jaguars in these
areas. However, the economy and culture revolves around cattle ranching in both areas, and jaguar
numbers have been greatly reduced. Quigley and Crawshaw (1992) estimated jaguar
density at only 1.4 resident adults per 100 km2 in
the Brazilian Pantanal, where relatively undisturbed, intact populations exist only in the
north-central and extreme southern parts of the region, separated by over 150 km.
Resident jaguar annual home ranges averaged 142 km2
(n= four females, one male). The male’s home range was not larger than the females’. Female home
ranges overlapped an average of 11.5% during the dry season, but not the wet. Mean wet season
home range (13 km2) was significantly smaller than
during the dry season due to extensive flooding; jaguars used only 4-13% of their total annual ranges
during the wet (Crawshaw and Quigley 1991).
Paraguayan Gran Chaco:
The Chaco thorn scrub is probably the only remaining place where jaguars occur in significant
numbers in an arid environment. Redford et al. (1990) estimated that 176,000
km2 of viable habitat remain in the Paraguayan Chaco,
an historical loss of 45%, with deforestation accelerating. Brooks (1990) relays reports of
Paraguayan biologists that jaguar populations are recovering from the depredations of the skin trade.
Although the ecology of the species has not been studied, various density estimates for the region
have been put forward, ranging from one jaguar per 25 km2
to one per 75 km2 (in Swank and Teer 1987).
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