Caught on camera: Sand cats may have a ‘sizable population’ in Qatar
Muhammad Ali Nawaz didn’t expect to see so many cats. Nawaz, a wildlife ecologist at Qatar University, had set out to survey Qatar for the sand cat, a tiny, seldom-studied felid that lives in deserts across Southwest and Central Asia, northern Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. Though there were anecdotal reports of the species in […]
A wildlife ecologist in Qatar was initially unprepared for the abundance of sand cats he encountered while conducting a survey. Muhammad Ali Nawaz, a researcher at Qatar University, embarked on a mission to study the sand cat, a rarely observed feline species inhabiting deserts across Southwest and Central Asia, northern Africa, and the Arabian Peninsula.
Despite anecdotal reports of sand cats in Qatar, systematic documentation of the species was lacking. To gather data, Nawaz and his team deployed a network of cameras that captured images of the elusive cats over 100 times between 2022 and 2025 within the Al-Ureiq Reserve, a protected area covering approximately 55 square kilometers.
The sheer number of photographs provides substantial evidence of the sand cat's presence in Qatar and sheds light on its habitat preferences. The findings were recently published in the journal Frontiers in Conservation Science. Nawaz expressed optimism regarding the discovery, stating, "This is a remarkable kind of a discovery and gives hope for the terrestrial wildlife in the country."
The sand cat's resilience in its desert environment is highlighted by its sandy fur, which offers excellent camouflage, its thick fur on the paws to protect against hot sand, its exceptional hearing to detect prey underground, and its diet consisting of small mammals.
Written by urgent.news from Mongabay's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
