Situation according to our country

Threat category: vulnerable. 

Heavy calculations made about the number of copies in 1987 (Hoogesteijn and Mondolfi) indicated the possible and hopeful figure of between 2,500 and 3,600 individuals. However, studies in density in other regions, values were smaller, jaguar densities of 1 per 13 km2 and up to 1 per 100 km2, depending on the habitat where the estimate is made (Smith 1976, Schaller & Crawshaw 1980, Crawshaw & Quigley 1984, Rabinowitz 1986b). 

What is clear is that until the fifties and even a few years later as seen in the data above, the jaguar has a wide distribution (Hoogesteijn & Mondolfi 1991a). But among other threats to the species, the most striking in Venezuela and other countries was that of hunting in this country were called 'tigreros areas' characterized by the abundance of the species and the attraction offered to sportsmen . Barinas State, the western and southern Apure and Guarico Cojedes became the second most important hunting of jaguars in the world, after Brazil's Mato Grosso (Hoogesteijn & Mondolfi 1991b). To this was added the explosion of the international fur market in the late sixties, when exported from South America for a total of 31,104 jaguar skins to the United States estimated that the quantity exported to Europe revolved around 7,000 to 9,000 additional skins ( Hoogesteijn & Mondolfi 1991a). 

Today, only the populations located in the states of Amazonas and Bolívar remain relatively stable, those located in Sierra de Perija, western plains and Andean foothills of the Orinoco delta are steadily decreasing and in the Cordillera de La Costa virtually extinct (Hoogesteijn & Mondolfi 1990, Medina et al. 1992). The increased pressure on the jaguar is located in the town located in the basin of Lake Maracaibo (Hoogesteijn com. Comm.). 

In Venezuela, the clearing of forests, hunting, mechanization and transportation are the main causes of the decline of the jaguars. This picture is aggravated, as a direct consequence of the action "devastating" the man has caused severe declines in natural prey of jaguars (peccaries, chigüere, deer, paca, baba, agouti, among others). Therefore, the jaguars are forced to feed on domestic livestock, leading to relentless reaction from farmers, who in one way or another, end up physically removing any cat to be around for their land and its surroundings. 

In Venezuela, created the first refuge of jaguars in the wild in 2003, The Private Refuge Wildlife Jaguares El Baul, which aims to establish a Private Area for Conservation, by which their owners contribute, through a collective effort, with conservation of the jaguar population in the region, their natural prey and their habitats.