The conservation of large carnivores remains a challenge for biodiversity conservation (Ingeman et al. 2022), as they combine strict ecological requirements (large territories, sensitivity to human disturbance) with coexistence conflicts with human activities (livestock farming, hunting, risk perception). Although the Eurasian lynx is currently considered as “least concerned” by the IUCN Red List, this favorable status conceals major disparities between the remaining historical population nuclei in Northern and Eastern Europe and small, isolated populations in Western Europe resulting from reintroduction programs for which long-term persistence remains in jeopardy (Chapron et al. 2014).
 
Several ambitious conservation programs have been launched to try and improve the long-term demographic status of these still fragile populations (e.g., Swiss Lynx Project, French National Action Plan for the Eurasian Lynx), and conservation actors have a dire need for modelling of population dynamics to project demographic trajectories and compare scenarios of alternative conservation actions (Gatti 2022). A major challenge for making accurate demographic predictions is that lynx are characterized by extensive territories, and their demographic processes are expected to be strongly dependent on landscape characteristics. To address this challenge and capture the complexity of interactions between landscape structure and lynx dispersal, survival and reproduction, Bauduin et al. (2025) develop here a spatially explicit individual-based model for the four Western European populations of Eurasian lynx: Alps, Jura, Vosges and Black Forest. They use fine-scale data on movement and habitat use as well as road collisions to build a detailed spatial layer of habitat suitability and collision risk to predict the demographic trajectory and spatial repartition of the four Western European core populations over the next 50 years. Their simulations reveal an optimistic outlook offer for the future of the lynx : the sizes of the four population cores are predicted to increase steadily until stabilization at saturation within 20-40 years. Furthermore, the four populations are expected to act as a functional metapopulation, with regular exchanges of individuals between adjacent populations.
These results open up a wide range of perspectives. First, different conservation scenarios (e.g., reintroduction strategies, landscape evolution, changes in fragmentation) can be run using the framework of the model and compared to identify priority actions. Second, the predictions of lynx expansion into new areas (like Italian and French Alps) can be used to anticipate potential usage conflicts and develop coexistence strategies to improve social acceptance of the species in these target areas. 
 
Although genetic information and the effects of inbreeding depression were not included in the model and could significantly lower the predicted growth rates in the long term, the conclusions are robust to a wide range of parameter values, and can be used both to inform lynx conservation strategies and to provide a priceless basis for the development of other SE-IBM for large mammals in human-inhabited landscapes.

References

Bauduin S, Germain E, Zimmermann F, Idelberger S, Herdtfelder M, Heurich M, Kramer-Schadt S, Duchamp C, Drouet-Hoguet N, Morand A, Blanc L, Charbonnel A, Gimenez O. 2025. Modelling Eurasian lynx populations in Western Europe: What prospects for the next 50 years?https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.10.22.465393

Chapron G, et al. 2014. Recovery of large carnivore in Europe’s modern human-dominated landscapes. Science 345: 1517-1519 https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1257553

Gatti S. 2022. National Action Plan for the Eurasian Lynx: restoring the Lynx to a favorable conservation status un France (2022-2026), 176 p.

Ingeman, K.E., Zhao, L.Z., Wolf, C. et al. 2022. Glimmers of hope in large carnivore recoveries.Sci Rep 12, 10005 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-022-13671-7