Low leopard populations in protected areas of Maputaland: a consequence of poaching, habitat condition, abundance of prey, and a top predator.

Identifying the primary causes affecting population densities and distribution of flagship species are necessary in developing sustainable management strategies for large carnivore conservation. We modeled drivers of spatial density of the common leopard () using a spatially explicit capture-recapture-Bayesian approach to understand their population dynamics in the Maputaland Conservation Unit, South Africa. We camera-trapped leopards in four protected areas (PAs) of varying sizes and disturbance levels covering 198 camera stations.