Gareth Mann, Ph.D.

Leopard Program, Director

Gareth Mann, Ph.D., is Director of Panthera's Leopard Program, based in Cape Town, South Africa. After obtaining his undergraduate and Masters degrees from the University of Cape Town, he began working on leopards for his Ph.D. research, which involved studying a low-density leopard population in the semi-arid mountains of the Little Karoo, South Africa. His groundbreaking research revealed the population's habitat preferences, population density and diet while also investigating how leopards are threatened by conflict with livestock farmers.

Dr. Mann completed his Ph.D. at Rhodes University in 2014 and joined Panthera in 2015. Since then, his primary focus has been monitoring leopard populations across southern Africa, with the goal of using this data to improve conservation management and identify threats.

In 2020, Gareth was selected to lead the Arabian Leopard Initiative, a joint venture between Panthera and the Royal Commission for AlUla aimed at conserving and restoring the Critically Endangered Arabian leopard in Saudi Arabia.

Apart from leopard research, Gareth has also worked on improving the management of a peri-urban baboon population around Cape Town, served as a spatial ecologist on a long-term biological monitoring project in northwestern Madagascar and studied fighting behavior in angulate tortoises. His passion lies in using applied research to guide conservation policy and management, particularly when addressing the economic and social challenges of extending conservation activities beyond protected areas.

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