The fields of Palencia and Cuenca will be the new homes of eleven of the 33 Iberian lynx born in 2024 in captive breeding centers. Valença, Icaro, Veloz, Virgo and returns have been released this week, the first three La Veguilla and Sierra Jarameña, Cuenca, and the other two in the Palencia Cerrato, both new areas of introduction of the species.
A few weeks of adaptation of adaptation will spend in a large surrounded land and then be released to the open field. They are the first of two new populations of Iberian Linces, to which four will be added in Palencia and two more in Cuenca.
According to WWF, there is no data that confirms the presence of lynx in the past in both areas, so they are considered ‘benign introductions’. These new populations, according to the conservation organization, “will not only contribute to the genetic diversification of the species and the expansion of its distribution area, but will also increase its resilience against the environmental changes planned for the next decades.”
For the Secretary of State for the Environment, Hugo Morán, who participated in the release of Virgo and Valdepiedras, “this species, which has been on the verge of extinction and has recently stopped being considered at risk, has become an emblem of How when a society wants, you can ».
Certainly, last June the IUCN, (International Union for the Conservation of Nature), described the situation of the lynx as a vulnerable, before it was in danger, which for WWF supposes «a worldwide success of conservation and the triumph of the strategies implemented, collaboration and commitment between administrations and entities that have joined the effort to recover the species ». Currently, according to the last census of the miteco there are 2011 registered lynx.
The rest of the puppies born in 2024, plus two orphans from the field, five will be released to the natural environment in the highlands of Lorca, Murcia; five in Sierra Arana, Andalusia; and two in Extremadura.