Research overview: occupancy modelling for tiger landscapes

Where camera-trap density estimation is too costly to deploy everywhere, occupancy modelling lets researchers map where tigers are present across large landscapes using detection-nondetection data from sign surveys. This overview surveys how occupancy frameworks account for imperfect detection, allowing unbiased estimates of the proportion of an area occupied and how it changes over time. Applied across tiger range, these methods reveal contraction at landscape edges, identify corridors still carrying tigers, and flag reserves losing their populations before counts collapse. The approach scales monitoring efficiently and supports adaptive management by linking occupancy to covariates such as prey, human disturbance, and protection. It matters because tracking distribution at landscape scale is essential for connectivity planning and for detecting decline early enough to intervene.