June 18, 2023 – The story of the rescue of the little Croatian lynx Karlo begins with Vedran Slijepčević, a senior lecturer at the Polytechnic in Karlovac. He is a member of the Wolf and Lynx Intervention Team within the Ministry of Economy. Additionally, he is an important team member in the Life Lynx project, which has successfully been combating the issue of extinction of the Dinaric and Southeastern Alpine Lynx, Croatia’s biggest cats.
As 24Sata writes, the professor was returning from a workshop when he received a call about a tiny lynx found along the motorway. Slijepčević quickly noticed that the lynx was a starving kitten. He only weighed 3.7 kilograms, and he was an orphan.
As a rule, every lynx kitten we confirm is an orphan is transported as soon as possible to the Zagreb Zoo. Once there, the most experienced wild animal veterinarians examine it and, if necessary, nurse it back to health. If the animal is too young or in poor condition, the only chance for survival and return to nature is a specialised recovery centre for lynxes. There are several of those in Europe. We have the best cooperation with Zoo Bojnice in Slovakia. Therefore, we decided that the Croatian lynx Karlo must continue his journey to a real hospital for baby lynxes, northeast of Bratislava.
Slovakian Care for the Little Croatian Lynx
In Slovakia, the weak little kitten made a splendid recovery. He has grown into a real beauty, so it is unsurprising that experts from the project to save the lynx population have assigned him a unique role! Croatian lynx Karlo will connect two separate lynx populations in Slovenia and Croatia with those in Italy!
Vedran Slijepčević explained in detail the reasons why the lynx was moved from an already small and endangered population in Croatia and Slovenia to Italy:
“We specifically released Karlo in the southeastern Alps because we are trying to build a kind of ‘lynx bridge’ that connects the Alpine population with the Dinaric one. Hopefully, we will not have to bring more animals from Romania and Slovakia in a few decades. If these two populations were to merge, it would create one large population. It would also be genetically diverse enough to be sustainable without significant human intervention.
Hope for Survival
The lynx is the rarest land mammal in Italy, experts remind. It is in danger of complete disappearance. Just like in Croatia, new individuals settling in critical areas is the only hope for the survival of the lynx.
“Colleagues from Italy are running the ULyCA2 (Urgent Lynx Conservation Action) project. This spring, they moved two lynxes from Switzerland and two lynxes from Romania to the Julian Alps, and now the Croatian lynx Karlo has joined them. The presence of lynxes in the Julian Alps is also important for the survival of lynxes in Croatia.
From Gorski Kotar to Zagreb, Slovakia, and Italy – the Croatian lynx Karlo went through a real adventure. Disney producers would surely be happy to use it for a film. However, as many times before, when it comes to Croatian lynxes, real fairy tales about their rescue are produced by the team from the fantastic Life Lynx project!
