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de Mello Beisiegel, B.; Sana, D.A.; Moraes jr, E.A.
The jaguar in the Atlantic Forest
2012  Cat News (Special Issue 7): 14-18

Jaguars _Panthera onca _are Critically Endangered (A4 b c d; C2 a i) in the Atlantic Forest because a population reduction of 50-90% was estimated in the past 10-15 years in the largest subpopulations of jaguars at the Upper Paran  and is suspected at the Coastal Atlantic Forest. The causes of reduction have not ceased since there is a continuous decrease in the Extent of Occurrence EOO, Area of Occupancy AOO and habitat quality, plus retaliatory and sport killing. The total number of mature individuals is less than 250 and the number of mature individuals is less than 50 in almost all subpopulations. The most serious threats to jaguars in the Atlantic Forest are habitat loss and degradation, loss of prey base and jaguar hunting. Legal protection has been ineffective in stopping Atlantic Forest deforestation and most protected areas have human settlements, causing direct habitat loss, habitat degradation and loss of prey base; other forms of habitat degradation are caused by illegal palm _Euterpe edulis _harvesters and poachers, as well as through natural and criminal fires that occur throughout the Atlantic Forest. Conservation measures most needed are the legal and effective protection of all the remaining large fragments of the Atlantic Forest through new restrictive Conservation Units, restoration of connectivity between the extant protected areas with known jaguar populations, effective protection of the extant Conservation Units in the form of intensive patrolling and an increase in ecological and genetic research to allow population management, which may be a necessity in some areas.

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