Three specimens have been seen in the meadow between Proserpina, the natural park and the Mirandilla district.
The technical director of the Cornalvo Park, Ángel Sánchez, explains that three Iberian lynx specimens have been seen in the meadow between Proserpina, Cornalvo and the Mirandilla district. A very large population of rabbits has developed in that area due to the management of two hunting societies, Mirandilla and Mérida. The rabbit has been spreading and lynxes have arrived there. Now they are calm and are settling in.
The problem is that all three specimens are on the southern edge of the park. Between the National 630,. the A-66, the Proserpina road and the Mirandilla access road. There are videos of the Casa de Campo de Mérida. The lynx, says the technical director, has two problems: lack of food and being run over. In the current location there is no food problem because there are many rabbits, but there are roads. In fact, some residents of Mirandilla have had to stop so as not to run over them. From the Park they want to promote the populations of rabbits in Cornalvo to generate the same habitat that has been generated next to the highway and move the lynxes to Cornalvo. You will find there a dehesa with little population density and well preserved up to the Sierra de Montánchez.
These are not the only lynxes that are in the news these days in Extremadura. Last weekend, TODAY published that another lynx had been visiting this town for days and was walking through its streets as if in its natural habitat. It is not scared and moves freely and naturally without being scared at all by human presence.
TODAY
So much so that it has been photographed and recorded on video by neighbors on several occasions. In one of them he can be seen hanging around the terrace of the El Paraíso restaurant, walking quietly and accessing a nearby orchard to rest before the astonished gaze of the customers.
The mayor, Fernando García Arévalo, has informed TODAY that he has already contacted the authorities and it was planned that he be transferred to his natural habitat.
Silene and Puna
This same month of May, two other Iberian lynxes have also been protagonists. Silene, who was born last year and was released in Hornachos from the Acebuche breeding center, in the province of Huelva and Puna, a specimen that was trapped in a double mesh located on a farm in the municipality of Don Benito. The latter could die but she managed to free herself from it. An enclosure type criticized by environmentalists and naturalists, who warn of its proliferation and little control for its eradication by the Administration.
The image of a female lynx trapped in a mesh flooded the social network Facebook. The naturalist Carlos de Hita made a comment in this sense. «A female Iberian lynx trapped in a double hunting mesh, one of the many deadly traps that, like a spider’s web, are found in the countryside. Fortunately, in this case, the cat could be saved, but there are many animals that die entangled in these double lines, “he wrote.
More than 200 specimens already live in Extremadura, counting the puppies born this year, which “constitutes a great milestone for a species that has been extinct since 2000,” according to the Extremaduran Executive.
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Eddie is an Australian news reporter with over 9 years in the industry and has published on Forbes and tech crunch.