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SCALP: Monitoring the lynx in the Alps and beyond

The project Status and Conservation of the Alpine Lynx Population (SCALP) is an ongoing programme aiming to co-ordinate the lynx monitoring, conservation and management activities in the Alps. The long-term goal of the SCALP is to help the still small and isolated populations to expand and to recov-er throughout the Alps in co-existence with people. The process is advanced and supervised by the SCALP Expert Group, which originally united lynx experts from all Alpine countries, but has recently been expanded to the Dinaric and Jura Mountains. We have gathered a lot of experience with monitoring an elusive species. The so-called “SCALP crite-ria”, which distinguish between “hard” and “soft” data, can help to raise awareness about the fact that false species identification may exist in many monitoring datasets, and thus improve population status assessments. The SCALP criteria had an outreach far beyond the Eurasian lynx and the Alps. It is however not only important to consider false positive data. Lynx detection probability varies in space and time. Therefore, we also have explored the possibility to produce distribution maps that take imperfect detection into account (i.e. occupancy). Regarding monitoring issues, we are far ad-vanced regarding distribution, but have only just started to address the “how many” question. Simi-lar to distributional data it is desirable to standardise also the interpretation of abundance estimates, which range from expert guestimates to robust estimates based on capture-recapture methods. At present, we are in the process of developing SCALP criteria for abundance estimates. Since its foundation in the early 1990s, SCALP experts have realized that merging the isolated lynx populations is vital for lynx conservation. Natural expansion is slow and therefore lynx translocation projects have been implemented starting in 2001 (LUNO), 2011 (Kalkalpen), 2014 (Friuli VG) and one planned for 2020 (Slovenian Alps). These projects all base on the “stepping-stone idea” that has been adapted to lynx conservation in the frame of SCALP. The basis for such a recovery strategy is the Pan-Alpine Conservation Strategy for lynx (PACS), produced by the SCALP expert group and adopted by the Standing Committee for the Berne Convention in 2001. Under the aspect of adaptive manage-ment, the PACS however needs an update to include new developments regarding progress of lynx, society and politics. The overall goal is to build up a viable population of this large carnivore that stretches across all the Alps and can be looked at in a metapopulation context, e.g. connectivity with neighbouring popula-tions. This goal can only be achieved through active management, as the present lynx occurrences are either too small and/or need to be genetically rehabilitated. Therefore, further translocations and reinforcements will be necessary. To assure the demographic and genetic rehabilitation of the Alpine metapopulation, a coordinated approach with a step-wise improvement in all small subpopu- lations is envisaged. The coordinated approach is not only necessary for monitoring and scientific issues, but also for achieving a consensus on management actions: translocations need to be fine-tuned between all partners and countries e.g. regarding timing, release site and origin of lynx for reinforcements and “stepping-stone releases”.

lynx, SCALP, monitoring

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