{"id":837036,"date":"2026-08-01T03:59:21","date_gmt":"2026-08-01T03:59:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/837036\/"},"modified":"2026-08-01T03:59:21","modified_gmt":"2026-08-01T03:59:21","slug":"trail-cameras-capture-rare-footage-of-the-ghost-of-the-forest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/837036\/","title":{"rendered":"Trail cameras capture rare footage of ‘the ghost of the forest’"},"content":{"rendered":"

A recent study of Sunda clouded leopards includes rare footage of the highly elusive species.<\/p>\n

The imagery was captured on trail cameras in previous years but was just released to the public with the publication of a study in the journal \u201cBiotropica.<\/a>\u201d It features an 8.5-year-old female Sunda clouded leopard in the rainforests of Borneo, the oldest wild female Sunda clouded leopard to ever be recorded.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"ACourtesy of Panthera\/Sabah Forestry Department<\/p>\n

The Sunda clouded leopard is native to Borneo and Sumatra and is listed as Vulnerable<\/a> on the International Union for Conservation of Nature\u2019s Red List, with an estimated population of fewer than 10,000 mature individuals worldwide.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Much remains unknown about the species, however, often dubbed \u201cthe ghosts of the forest,\u201d because of how easily they blend into their surroundings and how elusive they are to human onlookers.<\/p>\n

But, when researchers from the Sabah Forestry Department, the Sabah Wildlife Department, global wild cat conservation organization Panthera<\/a>, and local Indigenous peoples of Sabah set out to study the leopards, they became the first to document a female\u2019s lifespan in the wild.<\/p>\n

\"ACourtesy of Panthera\/Sabah Forestry Department\/Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research<\/p>\n

The never-before-seen footage and imagery was captured between 2007 and 2023 along three reserves in Sabah and observed 52 adult individuals, including 30 males and 22 females.<\/p>\n

Researchers also took away some surprising findings: The species was far more mobile than previously assumed, with some cats traveling up to 22 miles between forest reserves. Additionally, females were 68% more difficult to detect than males, due to the fact that females spend more time in trees.<\/p>\n

\"ACourtesy of Panthera\/Sabah Forestry Department\/Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research<\/p>\n

\u200d<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201cTheir physique hints at this, as their bodies are usually more slender and they have fluffier tails that help them balance,\u201d the study\u2019s lead author Katharina Kasper, a biologist with the Polish Academy of Sciences and the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research, told Scientific American<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cResident males, by contrast, spend much time circling and re-marking their territories [with urine], hence we capture them more often.\u201d<\/p>\n

The study also catalogued more information about life expectancies and the cat\u2019s relationship with its habitat.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"ACourtesy of Panthera\/Sabah Forestry Department\/Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research<\/p>\n

With the Sunda clouded leopard population on the decline, largely due to deforestation, illegal hunting, and habitat fragmentation, Kasper said this new research will be foundational to guiding future conservation efforts for the species.<\/p>\n

\u201cUltimately, refined life-history estimates form a necessary foundation for assessing the population status of the Sunda clouded leopard, currently classified as Vulnerable,\u201d the researchers concluded in their research.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u200d<\/p>\n

You may also like: Researchers rejoice upon realizing their trail cameras captured footage of a bird that hasn’t been documented in 140 years<\/a><\/p>\n

\u200d<\/p>\n

Featured Image: Courtesy of Panthera\/Sabah Forestry Department\/Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A recent study of Sunda clouded leopards includes rare footage of the highly elusive species. The imagery was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":837037,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[64,63,128,338],"class_list":["post-837036","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-science","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/837036","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=837036"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/837036\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/837037"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=837036"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=837036"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=837036"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}