Inside the first scientific leopard population survey of the Marico Biosphere Reserve
Hidden among the valleys and river corridors of the Marico, leopards move largely unseen. A landmark conservation survey is now giving scientists the first detailed glimpse into the population of these elusive cats within the Marico Biosphere Reserve.
There are some residents of the Marico we know well. We hear the birds at first light, watch antelope moving across the hillsides and sometimes find porcupine quills or tracks along the paths around Red Cliff. And then there are the animals that are almost always there without being seen.
The leopard is one of them. Secretive, solitary and perfectly adapted to disappearing into the landscape, a leopard can move through a valley, cross a rocky ridge or follow a river course without most of us ever knowing it was there. Occasionally, however, the Marico leaves us a clue: a paw print in soft earth, spoor along a track, or — increasingly — a photograph captured silently by a camera trap.
During 2025, those clues became part of something much bigger.
For the first time, the North West Provincial conservation authorities undertook a dedicated scientific survey of the leopard population within the Marico Biosphere Reserve, creating an important baseline from which these remarkable animals can be monitored into the future.
At Red Cliff, we have been privileged to play a small supporting role in this work.
Most importantly, particular recognition must go to John Power of North West Conservation, whose commitment to predator research and conservation has been instrumental in bringing systematic leopard monitoring into the Marico landscape.
Why count an animal that doesn’t want to be seen?
Counting leopards is not quite as simple as counting zebra at a waterhole. Leopards are elusive. They move across large areas, often travel at night and can pass through surprisingly close to human activity without ever revealing themselves.
Yet understanding how many leopards remain in an area — and whether those numbers are increasing, stable or declining — is enormously important. The leopard is currently classified as Vulnerable globally and nationally, making reliable monitoring an essential part of informed conservation. And the Marico presents an especially interesting landscape in which to study them.
Unlike a conventional fenced game reserve, the Marico Biosphere Reserve is a living and working landscape. It contains areas devoted to conservation alongside farms, tourism businesses, livestock operations and communities.
That is precisely what a biosphere reserve is intended to represent: a landscape in which conservation and sustainable human use have to find ways of existing together. The government’s report specifically highlights the importance of the Marico River catchment and the extensive areas within the Biosphere designated for conservation.
The leopard therefore tells us something not only about itself, but about the landscape through which it moves.
Nature’s own identification system
So how do you count an animal that would rather you didn’t find it? You let the leopard photograph itself.
Remote camera traps were positioned at carefully selected locations across the study area. These cameras are triggered when an animal passes in front of them, allowing researchers to monitor wildlife day and night without having to physically capture the animals. Camera trapping has become an especially valuable conservation tool for secretive cats such as leopards. And leopards conveniently carry their own identification cards. Each animal has a unique pattern of spots and rosettes. By comparing photographs of their coats, researchers can identify individual animals and distinguish one leopard from another.
For the Marico survey, photographs were assessed visually and with pattern-recognition technology to help improve the accuracy of individual identification. There is something rather wonderful about that: an animal designed by nature to disappear into its surroundings can be identified precisely because of the very markings that help it remain unseen.
What the cameras revealed
The first survey took place between August and November 2025. Thirty camera-trap stations were positioned across 12 participating properties within a study area of approximately 300 square kilometres. And gradually, the spotted shadows began to appear.
Researchers identified 15 individual leopards during the survey.
Nine were females, five were males and the sex of one animal could not be determined. The animals included different age classes, from younger leopards through to at least one male estimated to be older than seven years.
Using a scientific technique known as Spatially Explicit Capture-Recapture analysis, the researchers estimated a population density of approximately 3.9 leopards per 100 square kilometres.
The report describes this as a moderate leopard population density — particularly significant considering that much of this landscape is not a formally protected reserve.
For the Marico, that is an important first piece of the puzzle. It does not tell us everything. But for the first time, it gives conservationists a scientifically derived starting point.
What happens in the Marico after dark?
The cameras also offered a fascinating glimpse into when these animals move.
Overall, the leopards displayed the predominantly nocturnal behaviour commonly associated with populations living outside formally protected areas. Male leopards recorded during the survey were particularly nocturnal, although females were occasionally photographed during daylight hours. One of the highest levels of leopard activity was recorded at a site away from roads where the cameras detected no human traffic. There, the survey recorded a particularly high frequency of leopard detections.
It is a powerful reminder of the importance of the Marico’s quieter spaces — the valleys, river corridors, rocky ridges and relatively undisturbed areas that provide refuge for wildlife far beyond the boundaries of conventional nature reserves.
An unusual leopard among them
One camera-trap image revealed something particularly intriguing. Researchers recorded an unusually coloured leopard described in the report as a red form of leopard.
Similar colouration has previously been recorded elsewhere in the Central Bushveld region. The researchers believe the same animal may possibly have been photographed elsewhere in the Marico several years earlier, although the quality of the earlier photographs means this cannot be confirmed conclusively.
It is precisely these kinds of discoveries that make long-term monitoring so valuable.
A photograph taken today may become important years from now when researchers begin piecing together where animals have travelled, how long they have survived and how populations change.
Sharing a landscape with predators
Living alongside leopards is not always uncomplicated. The Marico is not an untouched wilderness. Livestock, people and predators share portions of the same landscape, and conflict can occur.
The study recorded livestock-related conflict on some participating properties. Significantly, the report emphasises investigating non-lethal approaches to reducing conflict, while recognising the importance of conservation within a Biosphere Reserve.
This is another reason good science matters.
Conservation decisions should not have to rely solely on occasional sightings, assumptions or anecdotal reports. The more we understand about leopard numbers, distribution and behaviour, the better equipped conservation authorities and landowners are to make informed decisions.
The beginning, rather than the conclusion
Perhaps the most important thing to understand about the 2025 survey is that it is not the end of the story.
It is the beginning.
The survey establishes a baseline against which future populations can be compared. The report recommends repeating monitoring annually at the same sites and increasing the number of camera-trap stations from 30 to around 40 to improve the precision of future population estimates. Over time, repeated surveys should begin answering the question that matters most:
Are the Marico’s leopards increasing, declining or remaining stable?
That cannot reliably be determined from one year’s photographs. It takes years of consistent monitoring.
Conservation is a shared endeavour
Projects of this nature also demonstrate how conservation increasingly extends beyond the boundaries of traditional national parks and nature reserves. Private landowners and farm managers across the Marico allowed researchers access to their properties and assisted the survey effort. The government report specifically acknowledges those landowners for making the work possible.
The project has also received technical support from SANBI and Panthera, with the report recognising the potential contribution of this work to the broader South African Leopard Monitoring Programme.
At Red Cliff Lodge, we are proud to contribute where we can — by opening our land to conservation research, assisting with camera traps, observing spoor and sharing what we see in the landscape.
But the scientific project and the data it generates belong where the credit rightly belongs: with the North West Provincial conservation authorities and the researchers responsible for the work.
We extend particular thanks to John Power of North West Conservation for his dedication to the project and to understanding the predators that still move through the greater Marico landscape.
The spotted shadows remain
Perhaps that is one of the great privileges of living somewhere like Red Cliff. We do not see everything that shares this landscape with us. And perhaps we shouldn’t.
Somewhere beyond the lodge, a leopard may walk silently along a rocky ridge tonight. Another may follow the river. One may cross a road minutes after we have passed without leaving anything more than a track in the dust.
They remain the spotted shadows of the Marico.
But thanks to careful scientific monitoring, those shadows are beginning to tell us their story.
About the research
The leopard monitoring work described in this article is an initiative of the North West Provincial Government’s conservation authorities. The 2025 study, Status of the Leopard Population of the Marico Biosphere Reserve, North West Province, was authored by John Power, Zoe Woodgate and Willem H. Boshoff. Red Cliff Lodge participates as a cooperating landowner and supporter of conservation research. Detailed camera locations, individual movement information and other sensitive operational information have deliberately not been reproduced here.
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