🧬 The Felid Wiki — 3,000 research summaries

This study combined species distribution modeling with projected climate change to locate the parts of High Asia most likely to remain suitable for snow leopards as temperatures rise. By overlaying cu…

Li, J., McCarthy, T.M., Wang, H., Weckworth, B.V., Schaller, G.B., Mishra, C., Lu, Z., Beissinger, S.R. · Biological Conservation · 2016

This paper argued that projections of species distributions under climate change carry large uncertainty arising from the choice of model, climate scenario, and other factors, and that ensemble foreca…

Araujo, M.B., New, M. · Trends in Ecology & Evolution · 2007

This paper introduced the MaxEnt method, a maximum-entropy approach for modeling species distributions from presence-only data, which became one of the most widely used tools in the field. Because muc…

Phillips, S.J., Anderson, R.P., Schapire, R.E. · Ecological Modelling · 2006

The high plateaus and meadows that underpin snow leopard prey systems are sensitive to warming, permafrost thaw, and altered precipitation. This overview surveys how degradation of alpine grassland on…

Snow cover shapes how snow leopards stalk prey, move across terrain, and den, so shifts in the timing, depth, and persistence of snow under warming can alter their ecology. This overview surveys how r…

Snow leopard persistence is tightly coupled to wild ungulate prey such as blue sheep (bharal), Himalayan ibex, and argali, whose forage and distribution shift with warming. This overview surveys how a…

Climate refugia, places relatively buffered from climate change where species can persist, are an increasingly central organizing idea in conservation planning. This overview surveys the typology of r…

The most realistic forecasts of cat futures combine climate change with land-use change, since for many forest cats habitat conversion is the faster, larger threat. This overview surveys how integrate…

A core prediction of climate change is that mountain species will shift upslope, and detecting such shifts in elusive cats is a methodological challenge. This overview surveys the evidence and approac…

Detecting climate-driven range shifts in snow leopards requires repeated, standardized occupancy surveys across elevation gradients. This overview surveys how camera-trap arrays and occupancy modeling…

The mountains of High Asia store water as snow and ice, and accelerating glacial retreat reshapes downstream hydrology that supports the meadows and prey of snow leopards. This overview surveys how ch…

An overview of the ecological mechanism by which warming pushes the alpine treeline upslope and squeezes the open, rocky terrain snow leopards use. As shrubs and forest advance into former alpine mead…

As suitable habitat contracts to higher, cooler refugia, the corridors linking snow leopard populations become critical for gene flow and recolonization. This overview surveys the methods researchers…

Protecting continuous elevation gradients lets species shift upslope as climate warms while staying within protected habitat, a recurring strategy for montane regions. This overview surveys the ration…

This survey reviews how snow leopard species distribution models are run across contrasting greenhouse-gas emissions pathways to bracket the range of plausible future habitat. It explains how downscal…

Snow leopards occur at naturally low density across a patchy, mountainous range, so climate-driven habitat fragmentation poses a real risk to gene flow. This overview surveys what noninvasive genetic…

The arid mountains of Mongolia and the Gobi support an important snow leopard population at the dry edge of the species' climate envelope. This overview surveys how warming and changing precipitation…

The grain and extent at which a habitat model is built strongly influence its conclusions, a key consideration for wide-ranging cats. This overview surveys how the choice of spatial resolution, from c…

Rugged terrain creates a mosaic of microclimates, with cool, shaded, or moist pockets that can buffer species against regional warming, a key idea for montane cats. This overview surveys how topograph…

Beyond distribution models, conservationists use structured climate vulnerability assessments that combine a species' exposure, sensitivity, and adaptive capacity into an overall risk rating. This ove…

Snow leopard range spans twelve countries, so climate-resilient conservation requires cooperation across contested international borders. This overview reviews how initiatives like the Global Snow Leo…

Climate warming is enabling herders to graze livestock at higher elevations and later into the season, expanding the overlap between domestic stock and snow leopard core habitat. This overview examine…

This widely cited review synthesized the theory and practice of species distribution models (SDMs), the statistical tools that relate species occurrence to environmental predictors to map current and…

Elith, J., Leathwick, J.R. · Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics · 2009

This landmark assessment modeled how upslope movement of the alpine treeline under warming could shrink the snow leopard's alpine and subalpine habitat across the Himalaya. Using climate envelopes and…

Forrest, J.L., Wikramanayake, E., Shrestha, R., Areendran, G., Gyeltshen, K., Maheshwari, A., Mazumdar, S., Naidoo, R., Thapa, G.J., Thapa, K. · Biological Conservation · 2012