Wildlife conservationists have sounded the alarm that leopard poaching in Sri Lanka is being carried out more systematically than previously thought, following the arrest in early August of a group of suspected hunters carrying a freshly skinned carcass in Maduru Oya National Park.

Conservation activist Sethil Muhandiram says there’s specific demand for skin, teeth, claws and even the flesh of leopards (Panthera pardus). He tells Mongabay this belies the prevailing conventional wisdom, echoed even by some conservation authorities, that leopards aren’t deliberately targeted by poachers in Sri Lanka, and that their killing is done opportunistically, when they succumb to traps set for wild boars or deer.

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