The last LCG meeting in the project was organized in Gospić on 28th of March 2024, where we were welcomed by Public Institution Nature Park Velebit. They have been of huge help during all the field activities in the LIFELynx project and they are going to continue with camera trap based monitoring in the years to come. Other public institutions also took part in the meeting: Lika-Senj County, National Park Northern Velebit, National Park Paklenica, National Park Plitvice lakes. All of them were cooperating in the project and are interested in continuing the monitoring of lynx and other wildlife in their management areas. Rewilding Velebit, which manages a large part of Velebit Mt. through the hunting ground lease system and are conducting a huge amount of fieldwork activities are also going to continue to take care of the lynx population’s future in the area. Even the Local Action Group Lika attended the meeting, raising the total number of participants to 24.
During the meeting, the organizers Veterinary Faculty of the University of Zagreb and Association Biom, presented the project achievements, how the photo identification is performed and the need for the post project activities. But, the last issue seemed unnecessary because all the participants were already involved in the activities in the previous years and are eager to continue it as a part of their regular wildlife monitoring and management. That also makes us happy because the camera traps network and orphan rescue report strategy will continue to work. What is maybe the most important result of this story is that the network of field associates has grown a lot and all of them are looking forward to the future joint cooperation and projects.
Ira Topličanec presented main outputs of the LIFE Lynx project.