The Arabian leopard (Panthera pardus nimr) has returned to the plateau of Nejd in Dhofar, the largest of Oman’s 11 governorates on the border with Yemen, a study released on World Arabian Leopard Day (February 10) noted.
This is heartening news for the beleaguered species, the largest felid found in the Arabian Peninsula on just two per cent of its former range.
Arabian leopards face multiple threats, including persecution by people, habitat loss and fragmentation, prey scarcity, capture for the illegal pet trade, and genetic depletion as a result of the small population size.
According to the study, the global wild population is estimated to comprise 100-120 individuals, with the largest known subpopulation in the Dhofar Governorate of southern Oman.
The Arabian leopard was once widespread in Dhofar, including the Nejd, which is a landscape of rolling plateaus, low cliffs and wadis (river valleys) that extend northward to the Empty Quarter sand desert.
The arid Nejd receives less than 100 mm of rainfall per year, with sparse vegetation dominated by thorn trees, as per the study.
It was believed that the Arabian leopard had been locally hunted to extinction in the Nejd. This assumption was made after surveys by camera traps in the central part of the Nejd between September 20, 2004 and June 17, 2007, and in the western Nejd between September 5 and December 30, 2013 did not detect leopards.
However, in 2011, scat found in the region was analysed and was confirmed to be that of an Arabian leopard. Camera trap images in 2014 confirmed that there were leopards in the central Nejd.
This prompted the authors of the study to conduct further surveys to determine whether leopards were resident in the area, or if their presence was a temporary expansion resulting from individuals dispersing from known populations in the south.
They set to work. During the period 2014-2021, they recorded 18 independent camera-trap detections of at least eight individual leopards and a cub. This, they say, provides unequivocal evidence that the Arabian leopard is not only resident but also breeding in the central and western Nejd.
“This finding extends the Arabian leopard’s known range in Oman by 40 km northwards. To improve detection probability, we recommend that camera-trap surveys for the leopard in the Arabian Peninsula are of at least 18 weeks duration. We advocate the designation of central and western areas of the Nejd as a National Nature Reserve, to protect critical habitat for the Arabian leopard and for other species in this region,” the authors wrote in the paper.
Northward expansion of the Critically Endangered Arabian leopard in Dhofar, Oman was published in the journal Oryx on February 10, 2025. The authors are Hadi Al Hikmani and Khalid Al Hikmani. Both authors are affiliated to the Office for Conservation of the Environment, Diwan of Royal Court, Muscat, Oman and the Royal Commission for AlUla, AlUla, Saudi Arabia.