Southern Tiger Cat (Leopardus guttulus) Classification

Effective conservation management depends on the maintenance of key areas that allow population connectivity across the landscape. However, the lack of knowledge of how habitat conversion affects species movement hinders the identification of these areas.

Here, we analyzed the impact of habitat fragmentation on landscape connectivity for Leopardus guttulus, a small Neotropical felid threatened by the high habitat fragmentation across the Atlantic Forest, and mapped and ranked the most important core areas and corridors for conservation actions. We also estimated genetic diversity indices and predicted the viability of the current core areas in the future.

Our analyses suggest that L. guttulus populations are fragmented, and connectivity links between populations are few and weak. We predict that due to their size, estimated density and low connectivity, some current core areas may not maintain viable populations in the long-term. Also, ongoing land-use changes may further isolate remaining populations, leading to progressive reductions in the populations they support.

In this study, we spatially prioritize the most critical areas for L. guttulus conservation and highlighted the urge that exists in the adoption of management measures for its conservation.

Sartor, Caroline & Cushman, Samuel & Wan, Ho Yi & Tirelli, Flávia & Althoff, Sérgio & Eizirik, Eduardo & Trigo, Tatiane & Freitas, Thales. (2024). Prioritizing conservation areas to mitigate connectivity loss and local extinction risk of a small carnivore (Leopardus guttulus) in South America. Biodiversity and Conservation. 33. 1-18. 10.1007/s10531-024-02817-w.

Recently, the tiger-cat species complex was split into Leopardus tigrinus and Leopardus guttulus, along with other proposed schemes. We performed a detailed analysis integrating ecological modeling, biogeography, and phenotype of the four originally recognized subspecies-tigrinus, oncilla, pardinoides, guttulus-and presented a new multidimensional niche depiction of the species.

Species distribution models used > 1400 records from museums and photographs, all checked for species accuracy. Morphological data were obtained from institutional/personal archives. Spotting patterns were established by integrating museum and photographic/camera-trap records.

Principal component analysis showed three clearly distinct groups, with the Central American specimens (oncilla) clustering entirely within those of the Andes, namely the pardinoides group of the cloud forests of the southern Central-American and Andean mountain chains (clouded tiger-cat); the tigrinus group of the savannas of the Guiana Shield and entral/northeastern Brazil (savanna tiger-cat); and the guttulus group in the lowland forests of the Atlantic Forest domain (Atlantic Forest tiger-cat). This scheme is supported by recent genetic analyses. All species displayed different spotting patterns, with some significant differences in body measurements/proportions.

The new distribution presented alarming reductions from the historic range of - 50.4% to - 68.2%. This multidimensional approach revealed a new species of the elusive and threatened tiger-cat complex.

de Oliveira, T.G et al.
Ecological modeling, biogeography, and phenotypic analyses setting the tiger cats' hyperdimensional niches reveal a new species
2024 Scientific Reports (14): 1-19

We analysed two sets of mitochondrial (mt) DNA data from tigrinas (traditionally, Leopardus tigrinus). We sampled in Costa Rica, Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, northwestern and northeastern Argentina and southern Brazil. Additionally, the analysis included some GenBank sequences from southern, central and northeastern Brazil.

The first mt set (mt ATP8+mt 16S rRNA with 41 tigrina) revealed the existence of seven different tigrina-like haplogroups. They could represent, at least, 4-6 different tigrina species following the Phylogenetic Species Concept (PSC). In the second mt set (mitogenomics with 18 tigrinas), we detected six different tigrina-like haplogroups. They could represent 4-5 different tigrina species - including a possible full new species, which has gone previously unnoticed to the world of science both morphologic and molecularly.

Coat patterns of several of these different tigrinas support the molecular differences. We also detected intense hybridization in many Andean tigrina with margays (Leopardus wiedii) and ocelots (Leopardus pardalis) as well as hybridization of one Bolivian tigrina with Leopardus geoffroyi. Similar hybridization was found for many of the southern Brazilian tigrina (Leopardus guttulus). All of the temporal split estimates for these tigrina haplogroups, together with those of the Leopardus species recognized to date, began in the late Pliocene but mostly occurred during the Pleistocene.

In agreement with the existence of multiple species within the traditional L. tigrinus species, we detected strong and significant spatial structure in the two mt data sets. There were clear circular clines. A major part of the analyses detected more genetic resemblance between the Central American + trans Andean Colombian and Ecuadorian tigrina (L. oncilla) with the most geographically distant tigrina from central and southern Brazil (L. guttulus; pure individuals not hybridized with L. geoffroyi). In comparison, the Andean tigrina taxa had intermediate geographical origins but were highly genetically differentiated both from the Central American + trans Andean Colombian-Ecuadorian tigrina and from the central and southern Brazilian tigrina.

Ruiz-Garc¡a, M.; Pinedo-Castro, M.; Shostell, J.M.
Small spotted bodies with multiple specific mitochondrial DNAs: existence of diverse and differentiated tigrina lineages or species (Leopardus spp: Felidae, Mammalia) throughout Latin America
2018  Mitochondrial DNA Part A (29): 993-1014

Prey killing behaviours in juvenile wild cats are subject to most influence by their mothers and siblings. The learning strategies enable an individual to create opportunities for conspecifics to participate in operant conditioning.

We present for the first time video recordings of two southern tigrinas learning to capture and kill a live cavy (Cavia aff. aperea). The videos demonstrate release and recapture of the prey multiple times, likely as practise for development of hunting skills.

Predation skills are particularly important for survival during adverse conditions such as low prey population densities, which commonly occur for some time after young cats become independent. In addition to providing the first description of the learning of predation behaviours in this species, our results offer general information on the ecology of Leopardus guttulus, a species recently recognised as distinct.

Bogoni, J.A.; Graipel, M.E.; de Castilho, P.V.; Peroni, N.
Development of predatory behaviours in young southern tigrinas (Leopardus guttulus)

2017  Mammalia (81): 1-4

Studies on feeding habits provide essential information to understand the biology of species, predators' behavior and also provide information on prey community dynamic in an area. However, to perform such studies can be difficult, especially when the species are smaller and elusive, such as Leopardus wiedii and Leopardus guttulus, two Neotropical felids. Information on the ecology of these species is still limited, thus our goal was to identify gaps and trends in publications on feeding habits of L. wiedii and L. guttulus, over the past 25 years, through a scientometric analysis.

We collected scientific publications on these species, indexed in three databases, which resulted in 181 publications. Only 16 publications refer to the feeding ecology of L. wiedii and L. guttulus, including five that were found out from the database researched. Our results indicate that the number of publications on the subject has not increased in the recent years. Moreover, there is a lack of research in several biomes and countries where the species occur.

Despite the low number of publications, there were several peaks which contributed to the understanding of feeding ecology of both species, and hence the ecological relationships with their prey. This study contributes evaluating the scenario of published work on the feeding ecology of two Neotropical felids, showing the existing gaps and encouraging the direction of future systematized research on this topic.

da Cunha, C.J.; Moreira, D.O.; Seibert, J.B.; Gatti, A.
Research gaps and trends on the feeding ecology of Leopardus wiedii and Leopardus guttulus
2017  Boletim do Museu de Biologia Profesor Mello Leitao (39): 23-37