Neofelis diardi

Taxonomy (Name)

Picture

Distribution, Range

The Sunda clouded leopard is probably restricted to the islands of Sumatra and Borneo (Buckley-Beason et al. 2006, Kitchener et al. 2007, Wilting et al. 2007a,b, Eizirik et al. submitted). It is unknown if there are still Sunda clouded leopards on the small Batu Islands close to Sumatra. There are clouded leopard fossils from Java (Meijaard 2004), but none in modern times. Although the Sunda region includes the Malay peninsula , Kitchener et al. (2007), on the basis of a small sample of skins, ascribed clouded leopards from the Malay peninsula to the mainland species, Neofelis nebulosa.

The map shows range within forest cover (European Commission, Joint Research Centre, 2003) to reflect patchiness caused by deforestation upon recommendation of the assessors (IUCN Cats Red List workshop 2007).

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Map

Country

Brunei Darussalam	IUCN
Cambodia
China
Indonesia	IUCN
Japan
Lao PDR
Malaysia	IUCN
Myanmar
Mongolia
Philippines
Singapore
Republic of Korea
Thailand
Vietnam

Status

International Status

IUCN Red List Category

VUIUCN

Justification

The Sunda clouded leopard is forest-dependent, and its habitat on the islands of Borneo and Sumatra is undergoing the world's highest deforestation rates (over 10% of lowland forest was lost in the past ten years) (Rautner et al. 2005, FAO 2007). Expansion of oil palm plantations is the most urgent threat: Malaysia and Indonesia have risen to become the world's largest producers of palm oil (Koh and Wilcove 2007). The species occurs at low densities (Wilting et al. 2006; A. Hearn and J. Ross pers. comm. 2007), particularly on the island of Sumatra (Hutujulu et al. 2007) and its total effective population size is suspected to be fewer than 10,000 mature individuals (IUCN Cats Red List Workshop 2007).

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CITES

Appendix IIUCN

CMS

National Status

Ecology Discription

Appearance

Habitat

On Sumatra it appears to be more abundant in hilly, montane areas, whereas on Borneo it also occurs in lowland rainforest (perhaps because there are no tigers on Borneo). It is forest-dependent, and does not go deep into plantations (oil palm, etc), although it can be found, perhaps at lower density, in logged forest. Records on Borneo are below 1,500 m. Occurs higher in Sumatra (IUCN Cats Red List Workshop 2007).

On Sumatra the Sunda clouded leopard occurs most probably in much lower densities (1.29/100 km2: Hutajulu et al. 2007) than on Borneo (6.4/100 km2: A. Hearn and J. Ross pers. comm. 2007 - 9/100 km2: Wilting et al. 2006). One explanation for this lower density might be that on Sumatra the clouded leopard co-occurs sympatric with the tiger, whereas on Borneo the clouded leopard is the largest carnivore

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Population size

Wilting et al. (2006) estimated a rough clouded leopard density of about 9 individuals per 100 km2, derived from classification of individual tracks in a study area of Tabin Wildlife Reserve. Their preliminary landscape analysis confirmed the presence of clouded leopards in 25% of Sabah?s surface, but only a small fraction of these areas are classified as totally protected forest reserves. As a first working hypothesis Wilting et al. (2006) extrapolated, based on their densities from Tabin Wildlife Reserve, the potential number of clouded leopards in Sabah to be 1,500-3,200 individuals. However, they pointed out that this number most likely overestimates the true number.

Based on a different methodology (camera traps), Andrew Hearn and Joanna Ross (unpubl. 2007) obtained a lower density in a different area of Sabah of 6.4 adults per 100 km2. This suggests the Sabah population could be at the low end or even below the above population estimates.

There are no population estimates for the remainder of its range in Borneo and Sumatra, but in lowland forest in Sumatra Hutujulu et al. (2007) estimated a low density of 29 adults per 100 km2, from camera traps. This suggests the population of Sumatra could be considerably lower than on Borneo.

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Behavior

It is strongly arboreal. Holden (2001) found that the encounter rate for clouded leopards increased significantly when camera traps were set along narrow ridges or in places where animals would have difficulty moving arboreally. In level or undulating terrain clouded leopards were seldom if ever photographed, suggesting that the species does move about in trees, although from tracks they are known to travel along logging roads and trails (Holden 2001, Gordon and Stewart 2007). Clouded leopards may be less arboreal on Borneo (Rabinowitz et al. 1987) than in other areas where tigers and leopards are sympatric.

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Diet

From local hunters, Rabinowitz et al. (1987) collected reports of clouded leopards with kills of a wide variety of prey, including young sambar deer, barking deer, mouse deer, bearded pig, palm civet, gray leaf monkey, fish and porcupine.

IUCN

Reproduction

Threat

Major Threat(s)

Sumatra and Borneo are undergoing high rates of deforestation, with oil palm plantations expanding rapidly, as well as logging and clearance for agriculture and settlement (Rautner et al. 2005, FAO 2007). There is substantial illegal trade in clouded leopard skins, partially fuelled by indiscriminate use of snare traps (TRAFFIC Southeast Asia pers. comm. 2007). Holden (2001) reported that in Sumatra, clouded leopards are snared accidentally in traps set for other species, but their parts have commercial value, and seven were killed in Kerinci Seblat's National Park from 2000-2001. Reports of clouded leopard attacking livestock are rare, but do occur, with one cat known to have been shot after reportedly taking goats from an enclave village surrounded by forest.

IUCN

Conservation and Measurement

International

CITES Appendix I (as Neofelis nebulosa), fully protected in Sumatra and Kalimantan (Indonesia), Sabah and Sarawak (Malaysia) and Brunei. It occurs in most protected areas along the Sumatran mountain spine, and in most protected areas on Borneo. More research is needed on population size and basic ecology (IUCN Cats Red List workshop, 2007).

IUCN

National

Conservation law

Protected Area

Other Coservation Projects

Citation

Buckley-Beason, V. 2004. Reclassification and genetic variation of the clouded leopard Neofelis nebulosa. Biosciences, Hood College.

Buckley-Beason, V. A., Johnson, W. E., Nash, W. G., Stanyon, R., Menninger, J. C., Driscoll, C. A., Howard, J., Bush, M., Page, J. E., Roelke, M. E., Stone, G., Martelli, P. P., Wen, C., Ling, L., Duraisingam, R. K., Lam, P. V. and O'Brien, S. J. 2006. Molecular Evidence for Species-Level Distinctions in Clouded Leopards. Current Biology 16: 2371-2376.

Eizirik, E., Johnson, W. E. and O'Brien, S. J. Submitted. Molecular systematics and revised classification of the family Felidae (Mammalia, Carnivora). Journal of Mammalogy.

European Commission, Joint Research Centre. 2003. Global Land Cover 2000 database.

FAO. 2007. State of the world's forests. United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, Rome, Italy.

Gordon, C. H. and Stewart, A.-M. E. 2007. The use of logging roads by clouded leopards. Cat News 47: 12-13.

Holden, J. 2001. Small cats in Kerinci Seblat National Park, Sumatra, Indonesia. Cat News 35: 11-14.

Hutujulu, B., Sunarto, Klenzendorf, S., Supriatna, J., Budiman, A. and Yahya, A. 2007. Study on the ecological characteristics of clouded leopard in Riau, Sumatra. In: J. Hughes and M. Mercer (eds), Felid Biology and Conservation Conference 17-20 September 2007 Abstracts, pp. 122. WildCRU, Oxford, UK.

Kitchener, A. C., Beaumont, M. A. and Richardson, D. 2006. Geographical Variation in the Clouded Leopard, Neofelis nebulosa, Reveals Two Species. Current Biology 16: 2377-2383.

Kitchener, A. C., Richardson, D. and Beaumont, M. A. 2007. A new old clouded leopard. Cat News 46: 26-27.

Koh, L. P. and Wilcove, D. S. 2007. Cashing in palm oil for conservation. Nature 448: 993-994.

Meijaard, E. 2004. Biogeographic history of the javan leopard Panthera pardus based on a craniometric analysis. Journal of Mammalogy 85: 302-310.

Rabinowitz, A. R., Andau, P. and Chai, P. P. K. 1987. The Clouded leopard in Malaysian Borneo. Oryx 21(2): 107.

Rautner, M. 2005. Borneo: treasure island at risk. WWF Germany, Frankfurt, Germany.

Wilting A., Buckley-Beason, V. A., Feldhaar, H., Gadau, J., O?Brien, S. J. and Linsenmair, S. E. 2007. Clouded leopard phylogeny revisited: support for species and subspecies recognition. Frontiers in Zoology 4: 15.

Wilting, A., Feldhaar, H., Buckley-Beason, V. A., Linsenmair, K. E. and O'Brien, S. J. 2007. Two modern species of clouded leopards: a molecular perspective. Cat News 47: 10-11.

Wilting, A., Fischer, F., Bakar, S. A. and Linsenmair, K. E. 2006. Clouded leopards, the secretive top-carnivore of South-East Asian rainforests: Their distribution, status and conservation needs in Sabah, Malaysia. BMC Ecology 6: 16.

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