Over nearly five decades, Dr. Howard Quigley dedicated his career to studying, conserving and shining a spotlight on our planet’s too often overlooked wild cats. A distinguished wildlife biologist, Dr. Quigley served as Panthera’s Conservation Science Executive Director and Jaguar Program Director. Previously, he served as Director of Panthera’s Puma Program; Executive Director of Craighead Beringia South; President of the University of Idaho’s Hornocker Wildlife Institute; and Global Carnivore Program Director at the Wildlife Conservation Society.
Demonstrative of his curious and pioneering nature, Dr. Quigley joined Dr. George Schaller and Brazilian partner, the late Dr. Peter Crawshaw, in the 1970s to conduct the world’s first comprehensive, ecological study on jaguars in the Brazilian Pantanal. Coming full circle, carrying out Panthera’s Jaguar Corridor Initiative — an unprecedented effort to connect and protect jaguars from Mexico to Argentina — became one of Dr. Quigley’s lifelong pursuits alongside his dear friend and Panthera Co-Founder, Dr. Alan Rabinowitz. Often consulting on jaguar recovery in the United States, Dr. Quigley implemented conservation strategies in the name of jaguar connectivity, coexistence with communities and conservation to the very end.
Dr. Howard Quigley explains how we’re protecting big cats across Latin America.
His research and conservation of pumas in the southern Yellowstone ecosystem through Craighead Beringia South continued at Panthera through the Teton Cougar Project. This initiative operated for a total of 16 years and serves as one of the few long-term puma projects in North America; it is still providing publications on puma ecology and behavior. A fascinating window into the lives of wildlife, the project focused on predator-prey interactions, puma population dynamics, and puma interactions with other large carnivores, including wolves, grizzly bears, pumas and black bears. This data is being used to improve scientists’ understanding of carnivore “guilds” and to inform and develop long-term conservation and management plans for large carnivores.
“At a time when wildlife conservation, and even more so wild cat conservation, was just a nascent concept, Howard served as one of the original founders of our unique field of study. A true pioneer who ultimately inspired an international community of scientists to follow in his footsteps, Howard dedicated a remarkable lifetime to studying some of our planet’s most incredible species while spreading the message of the ever-interconnected survival of wild cats, other wildlife, ecosystems and our own human species. We are forever indebted to him for his extraordinary contribution to bettering our planet.”
- Panthera Chief Executive Officer, Dr. Fred Launay
Panthera Co-Founder and former CEO Dr. Alan Rabinowitz and Dr. Howard Quigley collar a jaguar, Pantanal, Brazil
A member of the I.U.C.N. Cat Specialist Group, his conservation efforts also extended to giant pandas in China, Siberian tigers in the Russian Far East and black bears in the United States. Throughout his career, Dr. Quigley’s research and conservation actions focused on wild cat habitat use; conflict mitigation; predator-prey and human-cat interactions; community conservation education; and conservation and landscape planning.
His greatest accomplishment, however, may truly have been the scores of budding national biologists from Belize to Brazil whose minds he guided and hearts he inspired to devote their careers to saving wild cats — a cause that he rightly argued would make the Earth healthier for wildlife, wild lands and people.
Most comfortable on the go and in the field with the wildlife to which he dedicated his career, life and legacy, Howard has been a constant and warm presence in the conservation world. We will miss him dearly.
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© Sebastian Kennerknecht
