A little more than two decades ago, when the last specimen was killed in Montenegro, one of the cameras on the Montenegrin part of the Hajla recently recorded a Balkan lynx.
"I jumped, I jumped two meters in one place. I am very glad that I managed to find him", he says for "Vijesti" Semir Kardovic, a hiking guide from Rožaj, who for a decade, in cooperation with local and international organizations, has been looking for proof of whether there are Balkan lynx on the territory of Montenegro.
The Environmental Protection Agency of Montenegro (EPA) told the newsroom that the news that a lynx was recorded on the territory of Montenegro is great, and that confirmation of the presence of reproduction, i.e. a mother with young, is now expected.
"At that moment, we can consider that this forest phantom has returned to Montenegrin wild forests," they told "Vijesta".
Less than 50 individuals put it on the Red List
The Balkan lynx is the least numerous subspecies of the Eurasian lynx. The network of protected areas "Dinarida Parks" states that its number is estimated at less than 50 individuals, which is why, as extremely endangered, the Balkan lynx is on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species (a global list with data on the status of species conservation).
It inhabits the western part of North Macedonia, the eastern part of Albania and the Kosovo part of Prokletije. In the literature, several authors state that, although rare, the Balkan lynx existed in Montenegro:
"Pavle Rovinski, a Russian historian who spent a good part of his life in Montenegro (19th century), said that during hunting 'sometimes you come across a lynx', i.e. that you 'rarely come across a lynx'. Führer, the first ornithologist, researcher from Austria mentions that he is his heir to the throne Danilo, which came after the death of the king Nicholas, in the Cetinje court showed fur from a lynx caught in Sutorman in 1890, and that in a court hunt in November 1894 in the Bjelasica mountain, in which he also participated, in addition to other game, a 'strong specimen' of lynx was killed . AND Jovan Erdeljanović, a Serbian ethnologist, notes that there were also lynxes in the area of Bratonožić in earlier times,'' the author states. Jelena Vukašinović in the text published by the Civic Alliance (GA) about the disappearance of wild species in Montenegro in 2021.
Kardović said that the last lynx in Montenegro was registered 22 years ago. "Vijesti" interlocutors from the EPA say that it is an individual that was shot in the fall of 2002.
"To find an animal, you have to act like an animal"
As a mountain guide, nature lover, Semir Kardović has been actively involved in the search for that animal for more than a decade. As he told "Vijesta", during all that time, there was no official data that any individual was registered on Montenegrin territory.
"There are people who claim to have seen it, although they often confuse the Balkan lynx with a wild forest cat. It is not excluded that it is also in other places in Montenegro, but according to my research of the terrain, that part where it was filmed was the most suitable place where it could be kept. In the past ten years that I have been actively looking for him, I received a lot of information about where he was allegedly seen, as much as I could fit it in with my time, I managed to cover a part of the field where I thought he could be", Kardović told "Vijesti ".
As he adds, you cannot actively monitor the lynx, but rather monitor its food source, terrain, mountain exposure and terrain...
"To find an animal, you need to act like an animal," says Kardović with a smile.
The program in which the nature lover and mountain guide from Rožaj is involved in the search for lynx, as he said, is being implemented in cooperation with the organization for nature protection from France.
"For several years now, with French biologists who come through the organization 'Nikena Eco Adventures' from Podgorica, we have been actively looking for lynx. The French organization, following some sources where the Balkan lynx could be, in coordination with a local partner and us guides, i.e. naturalists, tried to create a picture of where it could be. We determined a search line somehow, from the Prokletije chain on the border with Albania, above Plav and Gusinje, all the way to the northernmost part of Prokletije, that is, Hajla," he explains.
To the reporter's comment that it sounds like looking for a needle in a haystack, he answers in the affirmative.
“Exactly that. That's what it is - when an animal species is rare, for which you only believe and have hope that it exists, at the same time you know that during the last decade in the search for the lynx, all the most relevant, but absolutely all, organizations dealing with nature, i.e. the animal world - from the Nature Conservancy, through the Center for the Protection and Study of Birds (CZIP), through their large game conservation program, that's how I covered some of the locations where I thought it was, and believed it could be, before after several months, it was finally captured on camera", Kardović tells "Vijesti".
Did he arrive from Kosovo?
As stated in professional texts about this wild cat, the Balkan lynx is an extremely territorial animal, living a solitary lifestyle and in a large territory, which only overlaps in marginal areas.
"They come into contact with other individuals of their species only during mating. The territory of males often overlaps with the habitats of females. The size of the living space is variable and is larger in males than in females. The size of the living space is primarily influenced by the availability of prey and the possibility of shelter. They mark the territory with urine and excrement", they state from "Parks Dinarida".
In an interview with "Vijesti", Kardović says that it is also possible that the specimen captured by the camera on the territory of Montenegro is one of those from Kosovo.
"That possibility is not ruled out, but if it is, and if he moved to the territory of Montenegro, it means that he is in some kind of migration. We cannot confirm that yet, nor do we know. We tried to compare the pictures with friends from Kosovo, who run a program on lynx protection, that is, who found it on the Kosovo side. We are trying to see if it is the same individual, but we cannot determine that yet," he says.
According to Kardović, if the lynx was taken in the February/March period, when it is the mating season, when the animal would have traveled more terrain than usual, the possibility that it was a Kosovo specimen would be higher.
"However, the lynx was recorded much later, so we believe that it is a separate individual," he says.
Further research is necessary
The interlocutor of "Vijesti" says that part of the public still believes that the lynx is a common species, but that the fact that less than 50 individuals have been registered speaks volumes about its threat.
That's why he expects that, after the individual lynx was recorded on camera in the territory of Montenegro, the institutions will take certain steps and adds that, in addition to the current activities, more should be done in terms of protection, but also research.
"No matter how enthusiastic I am as an individual, the institutions must react here. We are also aware of how much poaching happens on the territory of Montenegro... We will see further steps. Just today, another group of French researchers came and is investigating our forests regarding the existence of lynxes, and I hope we will get even more information and more material," he says.
When asked if it would be good to get to the recorded individual and mark it in some way, so that its movement can be followed, Kardović explains that it is a complex job.
"But very, very complex, which, first of all, requires a very long time, a lot of knowledge and, on the other hand, a lot of finances. And would it be desirable, of course. When you target one individual, you have a lot of knowledge about where it moves, how it moves, whether it covers only one region or goes from country to country. So we'll see what the future brings."
When asked about the moment when he saw the lynx on the video from the camera, he says that for him it was a confirmation of something he believed in and hoped for all these years.
"I jumped, I jumped two meters in one place. The point is that I literally received confirmation of something I believed in and hoped for. To this day, I receive information that people have seen him in the territories of Pljevlja, Žabjak, Beran municipality. A few years ago, there was a story that people saw him killed in a bar, and no one is investigating it, to see if it is true. When I published the video, 50 people contacted me, claiming that they see the lynx every day. But that doesn't mean anything if you don't have physical proof. And on the other hand, I am very glad that I managed to find him", said Kardović.
In the period from November 2014 to June 2018, the CZIP, through the program for the conservation of large animals, conducted four independent monitoring seasons of the Balkan lynx in the areas of the "Prokletije" National Park, as well as in the border areas between Montenegro and Kosovo, and Montenegro and Albania. through photo-traps. During each season, the position of the photo traps was changed in coordination with colleagues from Kosovo and Albania. During the monitoring period, the presence of the Balkan lynx in Montenegro was not confirmed.
The Balkan lynx recovery program has been implemented in North Macedonia and Albania since 2000, and in Montenegro and Kosovo since 2013.
Bonus video:
