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Jaguar Conservation
 

In Arizona and New Mexico, a state-led Jaguar Conservation Team (JAGCT or Team) is working to protect and conserve an animal that most people probably do not even know is native to the United States. Created in 1997, the JAGCT is a voluntary partnership among state, federal, and local government agencies, private individuals, and other entities with an interest in jaguar conservation. The efforts of the Team and its colleagues in Mexico are helping to create a promising future for the jaguar in the U.S.-Mexico borderlands.

JAGCT activities include: compiling scientific literature and occurrence information; developing a handling and kill-verification protocol; creating an education curriculum; monitoring jaguar presence through a Borderlands Detection Project; and developing procedures for the Malpai Borderlands Group to use in voluntarily compensating livestock owners for documented losses to depredating jaguars (no depredations have been documented as of January 2007). The JAGCT has also assessed the effects on jaguars of several predator control methods, and formed various committees to deal with other issues related to jaguar conservation.

As JAGCT tasks are completed, reports and other information are made available here in downloadable format, or in printed form upon request. Be sure to look here for periodic updates on JAGCT activities. Also, to receive electronically distributed updates on jaguar-related issues, including all public notices of JAGCT meetings, please visit http://www.azgfd.gov/signup and subscribe to the newsletter, Endangered Species Updates.

 
Program Goal:
Develop and implement a sound program for protecting and conserving jaguars in the United States, and, through cooperation with Mexico, the adjacent borderlands.
 
Habitat:
Jaguar habitat varies over the range of the species. Toward the center of their range, jaguars prefer lowland wet habitats, typically swampy savannas or tropical rain forests. At the northern and southern periphery, they occupy warmer, more arid habitat types, including oak-pine woodlands. In Arizona and New Mexico, they are known to have occurred in habitats ranging from desert grassland to montane-conifer forest. Their movement corridors in the Southwest are not yet well known, but probably include a variety of riparian-dominated lowland and upland habitats that connect some of the isolated mountains and foothills in this region.
 
Distribution:
Borderland Jaguar Range (AZ, NM, Mexico)Jaguars once ranged from southern Argentina north along the coasts of Central America and Mexico and into the southwestern United States as far north as the Grand Canyon. By the late 1900s, jaguars were thought to have been eliminated from the United States.
 
Current Status
In 1996, independent discovery of two different jaguars changed prevailing perceptions about the species' absence from the United States. In March 1996, houndsman/rancher Warner Glenn discovered and photographed a jaguar in southwestern New Mexico (see Eyes of Fire, below). In August 1996, another houndsman, Jack Childs, discovered a different jaguar in south-central Arizona. By 2007, JAGCT monitoring efforts had yielded several more documented records from the U.S.-Mexico borderlands, including records affirming that the jaguar Jack Childs observed in August 1996 was present in Arizona several more times after that, including as recently as January 2007. In no small way, Warner Glenn and Jack Childs are responsible for inspiring the borderlands jaguar conservation effort in which they continue to participate.
 
Legal Status:
Although there are different challenges in different areas, loss and fragmentation of habitat and illegal killing continue to threaten jaguars throughout much of their range. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) listed jaguars outside the United States as an endangered species in 1972. The species was protected under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) in 1973. In 1997, with enough solid biological evidence to indicate that the Arizona and New Mexico borderlands are a legitimate part of the jaguar's curent range, USFWS listed jaguars as endangered in the United States. Jaguars are also protected by state law in both Arizona and New Mexico.
 
Conservation Needs:

The Jaguar Conservation Team, made up of land-owners, ranchers, citizen groups, scientists, and state and federal agency representatives from New Mexico, Arizona, and Mexico, is working to identify and meet jaguar conservation needs throughout the U.S.-Mexico borderlands. Much progress has been made since 1997, but the JAGCT still needs help from the public, especially in locating these magnficent cats.

Please report all possible jaguar sightings (see pamphlet, below) to the Arizona Game and Fish Department (623-236-7573) or the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish (505-522-9796). Take detailed notes on your observation before reporting it. Surprisingly, it is very easy to mistake many things as a jaguar, including bobcats, mountain lions, and even feral housecats. It takes time and costs money to investigate the possible sightings that are reported, so please be careful about reporting leads.

Hopefully, the conservation efforts being implemented today by the JAGCT and its cooperators, including the public, will help provide future generations in the United States and Mexico with a unique gift -- continued existence of jaguars roaming freely across the U.S.-Mexico borderlands!

 
General Jaguar Information:
Jaguars breed year-round, range-wide. Gestation is about 100 days; litters range from one to four cubs (usually two). The cubs remain with the mother for nearly two years. Females mature at three years of age, males at four. Studies have documented few wild jaguars more than 11 years old.

The list of prey taken by jaguars includes more than 85 species, such as javelina, armadillos, caimans, turtles, birds, fish, and various livestock. In Brazil, people claim the jaguar sometimes uses its tail as a lure for fish. In the U.S.-Mexico borderlands, javelina and deer are probably dietary mainstays.

Jaguars are known to be far ranging. Movements of 500 miles have been recorded. If food is abundant, they may become sedentary and range over only a few square miles. Like most cats, this one is territorial and marks its boundaries with scents. Jaguars roar to announce their presence to other jagues; no other North American cat roars.

For jaguars to thrive or even to persist in Arizona, a few modest needs must be met. They must be protected from being killed. They must have an adequate prey base. And they must have movement corridors to connect with source populations in northern Mexico. Abundance of available prey, and suitable resting sites, are more important than any particular vegetation type to this wide-ranging species. The core population of jaguars in northern Mexico must also be sufficiently large to provide for dispersal into the U.S.-Mexico borderlands. Field research, especially on habitat use and movement patterns, in Arizona, New Mexico, and Mexico is underway to provide a sound scientific basis for management decisions, but much more work is needed.
 
Program Status:

As a member and chair of the JAGCT, the Arizona Game and Fish Department (AGFD) maintains this webpage to provide information on actions directed toward conservation of the only "roaring" cat that is native to North America. Updates usually occur after JAGCT meetings, which have been held at least twice each year since April 1997.

In 2006-2007, JAGCT meeting discussions focused mainly on several key issues. Principal among them has been the need for renewal and revision of the Memorandum of Agreement under which AGFD and the New Mexico Game and Fish Department (NMDGF) have convened the JAGCT since it was created in 1997. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) never signed that agreement, but has been an active participant in JAGCT along with the Signatory agencies and other cooperators. Another key issue has been the need to revise and update the Jaguar Conservation Assessment and Strategy for the Jaguar in Arizona and New Mexico (1997) that provides a science-based adaptive management framework for JAGCT activities.

Much has changed since 1997, including (for example) more extensive documentation of persistent jaguar presence in the borderlands (in AZ as recently as January 22, 2007), an exciting conservation effort in Mexico that in part was stimulated by and is well coordinated with the AZ-NM effort, and, of course, federal listing of the jaguar in AZ-NM under the Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA; as amended). New challenges have also emerged, including how the United States will control its southerly border and ensure National Security, while still enabling wildlife to move back and forth as necessary to sustain populations that represent national and international assets of immeasurable value.

 

The results of these JAGCT discussions have been two-fold. First, in February 2007 AGFD and NMDGF recrafted their 1997 State-to-State conservation agreement for the jaguar as a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU; PDF, 93kb), with USFWS also signing on as the first Signatory Cooperator. AGFD and NMDGF have also invited previous Signatories and others to consider becoming Signatories to the new MOU. At the May 2-3, 2007 JAGCT meeting in Douglas AZ, AGFD, NMDGF, and USFWS will vote on acceptance of additional Signatories. Agencies may also become Signatories later on, but there is good reason to consider becoming a Signatory at the May 2-3 meeting.

 

At the May 2-3 JAGCT meeting, after the "new Signatories" vote referenced above, AGFD and NMDGF will present their current draft of a new Conservation Assessment and Framework for the Jaguar in Arizona, New Mexico, and Northern Mexico (PDF, 137kb). When completed (ca. July 2007), this document will be submitted to USFWS for acceptance as the states' conservation plan under Section 6 of ESA. Discussion of issues and concerns at the May 2-3 JAGCT meeting will be key to the states' final revisions in the Framework before submitting it to USFWS. All participants in that meeting will be able to speak on any issue, but any votes taken on specific Framework content recommendations to AGFD and NMDGF will only be open to Signatory agencies. The same Signatories-only approach will apply to JAGCT votes on any other issues discussed at that meeting or subsequent meetings.

 

All agencies, whether or not they are or might become Signatories or Cooperators, and the public are invited to submit comment on the draft AGFD-NMDGF Conservation Framework. Comment on that document should be emailed to jaguar@azgfd.gov or submitted through the U.S. mail to Jaguar Conservation Team Chair, c/o Arizona Game and Fish Department, 2221 West Greenway Road, Phoenix, AZ 85086-5000-4399.

Comment on the draft Framework must be received no later than March 19, 2007 to be considered.

Additional public comment and discussion opportunities will be realized at the May 2-3 JAGCT meeting in Douglas AZ, before AGFD and NMDGF make their final changes to the Framework and submit it to USFWS.

 

AGFD and NMDGF, with assistance from USFWS, have carefully crafted the new MOU and are crafting the draft Framework to maintain their core commitments in several areas of jaguar conservation: (1) maintaining an adequate and appropriate conservation program for the jaguar that is consistent with their respective state authorities, mission, and obligations under Section 6 of ESA; (2) voluntary conservation, with an emphasis on local stakeholder participation in public forums, as opposed to regulatory action; (3) protecting jaguars against illegal take (killing) and enacting state penalties commensurate with federal penalties under ESA for illegal take; (4) education and outreach as a means of effecting jaguar conservation; and (5) ensuring that jaguars are appropriately able to roam back and forth across the US-Mexico border and within Arizona and New Mexico when they are present here.

 

The JAGCT Borderlands Detection Project, the educational curriculum that JAGCT drafted with professional educators, and diligent coordination and cooperation with Mexico on jaguar conservation have all been very well received, and are yielding results that we can only begin to appreciate at this early stage. However, much remains to be done, and collaboration with other agencies and the public within the MOU emphasis areas of Arizona and New Mexico will be the key to long-term success. We hope you will help us accomplish what needs to be done.

 

Again, to receive electronically distributed updates on jaguar-related issues, including all public notices of JAGCT meetings, please visit http://www.azgfd.gov/signup and subscribe to the newsletter, Endangered Species Updates.

NOTE: The following files are PDFs and require the free Adobe Acrobat Reader. For text-only, use Adobe Access.

Jaguar Conservation Team (JAGCT) Final Summary Notes:
- February 1, 2007 [PDF, 57kb]

- June 29, 2006 [PDF, 42kb]

- August 4, 2005 [PDF, 63kb]
- January 13, 2005 [PDF, 25kb]
- August 8, 2004 [PDF, 47kb]
- January 23, 2004 [PDF, 43kb]
- July 31, 2003 [PDF, 103kb]
- January 20, 2003 [PDF, 98kb]
- July 25, 2002 [PDF, 86kb]
- January 31, 2002 [PDF, 103kb]
- July 28, 2001 [PDF, 67kb]
- January 18, 2001 [PDF, 92kb]
- July 20, 2000 [PDF, 76kb]
- January 19, 2000 [PDF, 67kb]
- July 15, 1999 [PDF, 117kb]
- January 21, 1999 [PDF, 85kb]
- July 30, 1998 [PDF, 92kb]
- April 23, 1998 [PDF, 103kb]
- October 15, 1997 [PDF, 110kb]
- July 30, 1997 [PDF, 109kb]
- April 30, 1997 [PDF, 118kb]

Jaguar Habitat Subcommittee Final Summary Notes:
- November 18, 2005 [PDF, 35kb]
- August 30, 2004 [PDF, 35kb]

- December 12, 2000 [PDF, 75kb]
- July 20, 2000 [PDF, 89kb]
- June 22, 2000 [PDF, 75kb]
- October 21, 1999 [PDF, 68kb]
- July 15, 1999 [PDF, 61kb]
- April 15, 1999 [PDF, 67kb]
- January 21, 1999 [PDF, 55kb]
- September 22, 1998 [PDF, 83kb]
- June 29, 1998 [PDF, 81kb]

 
Available Publications:
Evaluation of the Relative Suitability of Potential Jaguar Habitat in New Mexico by K.A. Menke and C.L. Hayes. 2003. New Mexico Department of Game and Fish. Albuquerque, New Mexico. [PDF, 855kb]

SECOND DRAFT Review of Jaguar Conservation Agreement Activities March 1997 through December 2003
by D.M. O'Neill and W.E. Van Pelt. 2004. Arizona Game and Fish Department, Phoenix, Arizona. [PDF, 350kb]

Conservation Assessment and Strategy for the Jaguar in Arizona and New Mexico by T.B. Johnson and W.E. Van Pelt. 1997. Nongame and Endangered Wildlife Program Technical Report 105. Arizona Game and Fish Department, Phoenix, Arizona. [PDF, 196kb]

Annual Report on the Jaguar Conservation Agreement for Arizona and New Mexico by W.E. Van Pelt and T.B. Johnson. 1998. Nongame and Endangered Wildlife Program Technical Report 132. Arizona Game and Fish Department, Phoenix, Arizona. [PDF, 185kb]

Characterizing and Mapping Potential Jaguar Habitat in Arizona by James R. Hatten, Annalaura Averill-Murray and W.E. Van Pelt. 2003. Nongame and Endangered Wildlife Program Technical Report 203. Arizona Game and Fish Department, Phoenix, Arizona. [PDF, 3.49mb]

Wanted: Information leading to the protection and conservation of jaguars along the Arizona-New Mexico borderlands (pamphlet). [PDF, 78kb]

Other publications NOT available through AZGFD:
Tracking the Felids of the Borderlands Available by contacting Jack Childs, 4069 W. Valencia Rd., Tucson, AZ 85746. Phone: (520) 883-4029.

Eyes of Fire - Encounter with a Borderlands Jaguar Available by contacting Warner Glenn, PO Drawer 1039, Douglas, AZ 85608. Phone: (520) 558-2470.
 
Additional information:
Inquiries about jaguar conservation efforts in Arizona and the Southwest, including activities of the Jaguar Conservation Team, should be directed via email to jaguar@azgfd.gov or via USPS mail to: Jaguar Conservation Project, Nongame Branch, Arizona Game and Fish Department, 5000 W. Carefree Highway, Phoenix, AZ 85086-5000-4399.
 
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Downloads [More]
- JAGCT Conservation Framework [PDF, 150kb]
- JAGCT MOU 2007-2011 [PDF, 93kb]
- JAGCT Conservation Framework: Public Comment on May 2006 Draft[PDF, 150 kb]
- JAGCT Conservation Framework: Public Review Draft May 2006 [PDF, 136 kb]
  Preliminary Summary of 2006 Mexico Workshop on Jaguar Population Viability Assessment [PDF, 42kb]
  Translated Excerpts from 2006 Mexico Workshop on Jaguar Conservation and Management [PDF, 59kb]
  Translated Excerpts from 2005 Mexico Workshop on Jaguar in 21st Century [PDF, 76kb]
- Jaguar Habitat Committee Summary Report on AZ-NM Habitats[PDF, 87 kb]
NOTE: The following files are PDF's and require the free Adobe Acrobat Reader.For text-only, use Adobe Access.
 

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