KOTA KINABALU: The survival of the elusive Sunda clouded leopard (Neofelis diardi) in Sabah depends fundamentally on intact and connected forest networks, with a new study reaffirming calls to protect and restore forest corridors within agricultural landscapes, says Dr Benoit Goossens.
The director of Danau Girang Field Centre and professor at Cardiff University, said the study, published in the journal Animal Biotelemetry, challenged previous broad spatial models that artificially inflated the animals’ home ranges into agricultural areas.
He said oil palm plantations served mainly as temporary conduits, showing that while Sunda clouded leopards could cross human-modified habitats, they relied heavily on intact forests.
“Protecting natural forest patches, riparian corridors and distinct features like ridgelines is non-negotiable if we want to maintain landscape connectivity and social stability for this species,” he said.
Goossens, one of the paper’s authors, said the study highlighted the urgent need for land managers and policymakers in Sabah and across South-East Asia to prioritise the protection and restoration of forest corridors within agricultural landscapes.
The study, conducted by an international team of researchers, combined high-resolution global positioning system (GPS) telemetry with long-term camera-trap surveys to examine how the threatened apex predator navigates fragmented, human-modified landscapes.
The research was carried out across about 2,000 sq km of the Lower Kinabatangan floodplain, comprising protected riparian forests, commercial reserves and extensive oil palm plantations.
First author Dr Andrew Hearn said tracked adult males maintained home ranges of some 41 sq km, while an adult female occupied a significantly smaller range of about seven sq km.
Male clouded leopards also showed strong territorial segregation, with only about 8% overlap between their ranges, suggesting strict boundary enforcement.
Female ranges, however, substantially overlapped with those of multiple males, he said.
Hearn said the animals relied almost exclusively on native forests for resting and stationary periods, with forest use ranging from 98% to 100%.
Although individuals occasionally crossed oil palm plantations and roads, they moved nearly twice as fast through these open areas, at up to 1.49kph, compared with 0.37 to 0.53kph in natural forests.
“This shows the animals treating agricultural areas as high-risk transit zones rather than viable habitats,” he said.
The study also found that the species was cathemeral, meaning it was active during both day and night, with activity peaks at dawn and dusk.
Hearn said researchers also identified critical topographical features that acted as social “communication hubs”.
“A single, isolated limestone ridge measuring just 200m long – the Batangan Ridge – accounted for over 54% of all camera-trap detections across the entire 2,000 sq km study area,” he said.
Hearn said the ridge was visited frequently by multiple individuals, with overlapping male territories and most observed scent-marking behaviour occurring there.
The findings highlighted the disproportionate ecological importance of unique landscape features in facilitating communication and maintaining connectivity among the species, he added.
