Doru, a four-year-old male lynx from the Carpathian mountains in Romania, was released in the Risnjak National Park on Saturday morning. It is the first out of the four lynxes to be settled in Croatia as part of the LIFE Lynx project.
Doru. Photo: Berde Lajos
Doru weights twenty-one kilograms and was caught in late February in the Romanian forests. The Association for Biological Diversity (ACDB) was in charge of the catching and handling the lynx. For that purpose, a protocol among LIFE Lynx partners was prepared. Before the transport, Doru spent two months in quarantine to ensure he would not transmit infectious diseases to the new habitat. On Thursday, 2nd of May, special transport was organized in cooperation with the Zagreb ZOO, in order for him to arrive safely in Croatia.
After many years of preparations, this important event for the preservation of Croatian biodiversity finally happened. In the late 19th century, lynxes disappeared from the forests of Croatia and Slovenia, but hunters and foresters brought them back in 1973. Now it is up to the LIFE Lynx team to continue with the fight to save the Dinaric lynx population from extinction. Of course, none of this would be possible without the support from the Ministry of Environment (Ministerul Mediului), the Regional office for forests – Romsilva (Regia Nationala a Padurilor – Romsilva) and the Romanian Veterinary Authority (A.N.S.V.S.A.) to whom we are very grateful for the cooperation.
Now that Doru is free and discovering its new habitat, a telemetry collar that uses satellite to determine the location of the animal will follow its movements and send us locations. We hope Doru will soon determine his new territory in the Dinaric mountains.
Release of Doru in NP Risnjak. Photo: Gregor Šubic
Release of Doru in NP Risnjak. Photo: Gregor Šubic
Good luck Doru!