Adapted conservation measures are required to save the Iberian lynx in a changing climate

This high-profile study coupled climate, prey, and disease dynamics with metapopulation modeling to project the fate of the critically endangered Iberian lynx. It found that standard reintroduction plans, which ignored climate change, could fail because warming would degrade the Mediterranean scrub and rabbit-prey conditions the lynx needs, potentially driving the species toward extinction within decades despite recovery efforts. By contrast, climate-informed translocation that tracks shifting suitable habitat could sustain the population. The work is a landmark for demonstrating, with an iconic felid, that conservation planning ignoring climate can backfire, and it reshaped Iberian lynx recovery toward proactively establishing populations in areas projected to remain or become suitable.