Aletris neils biography of christopher kennedy

A little while ago, I had the distinct privilege of being able to sit down with Dr. Aletris Neils. Neils is the Executive Director of Conservation CATalyst , the big cat conservation group behind the groundbreaking video of El Jefe that became a media sensation in February, They were also featured in an article about American jaguars that appeared in the October, edition of The Smithsonian.

“This jaguar doesn't belong to any one person,” said Aletris Neils, founder and executive director of the Tucson-based nonprofit group Conservation CATalyst.

In addition to their borderlands jaguar project, Conservation CATalyst also conducts conservation outreach and research on caracals Caracal caracal in Namibia. During our interview, I asked Dr. Neils a series of questions about her work with caracals. What follows is a condensed version of our conversation. I am a carnivore conservation biologist, and I specifically focus on conflicts involving carnivores and livestock.

The products generated by this task are the pseudotopographic database and site specific hydrologic history or characterization for the plant.

I grew up on a ranch in Arizona, where we used to have problems with predators mostly feral dogs. I guess this is how I became interested in human-carnivore conflicts, although for some reason I was drawn to cats. I initially started working as a tracker. I was invited to volunteer with the Northern Jaguar Preserve , where I primarily helped to collect hair that could be used for DNA analyses.

I was eventually invited to Namibia to work with the Cheetah Conservation Fund in a similar capacity. I was mesmerized by that caracal, and I wanted to learn more about them. I found that little is known about caracals, and that they are highly persecuted throughout their range — especially in Southern Africa.