- The guiña, a small wildcat, has been moved to least concern on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Found only in Chile and Argentina, this small cat was previously listed as vulnerable.
- But the threat downgrade isn’t a sign of conservation success, researchers say. Rather, it reflects more in-depth knowledge of the species. Three out of six recognized subpopulations remain highly in danger of localized extinction and need special attention and urgent conservation action.
- Some conservationists see the downgrade in status as concerning (especially considering the daunting range of threats and number of imperiled populations) and they fear the improved listing may take attention away from the species and result in a decline in conservation funding.
The guiña, a small cat species found only in Chile and northern Argentina, has just been reclassified as of least concern by the IUCN. Until recently it was listed as vulnerable to extinction. Normally such a downgrading in threat status would be cause for celebration, but in this case some conservationists are hesitant.
“It’s not that the species is doing better, it’s that we have better information,” explains Nicolas Galvez, who led the recent IUCN assessment and is an associate professor at Pontifical Catholic University of Chile.
This new information, he says, includes a higher population estimate and data showing guiña (Leopardus guigna) can survive not only in their native forest habitat, but in some altered agricultural landscapes. “Because of this better information, the species has been listed to least concern,” he says.
In 2014, when the species was last assessed, this information was not available. But Galvez expects this status shift “will raise a lot of eyebrows in the environmental world and feline conservation world.”
That’s because guiña continue facing a daunting number of threats in the wild, including human-wildlife conflict, habitat loss, disease contracted from domestic dogs and cats, climate change and, increasingly, severe forest fires in parts of its range.
Camera trap footage of a guiña. It is now considered of least concern across the entire distribution of the species, but three of six subpopulations remain in high danger of extinction. Image courtesy of Nicolás Gálvez
Like other small cat species, guiña play an important and often understated role in maintaining ecosystem health by preying upon rodents and small mammals, helping control their populations. That role could be especially important to the survival of native species in Chile’s Valdivian Forest biodiversity hotspot.
Galvez notes that guiña also prey upon the long-tailed colilargo (Oligoryzomys longicaudatus), a rodent that is the main vector of the potentially deadly hantavirus. “This has important implications for human health, particularly for forestry and agricultural workers, who represent the majority of fatal cases according to past statistics,” he says.
Though this small cat appears to be thriving in southern Chile, three other populations — in Argentina, central and northern Chile — are in a critical state. “In our analysis, we highlight that three populations within the species range are at higher risk because they have very few individuals and therefore need special attention and urgent conservation actions,” says Constanza Napolitano, associate professor at Chile’s University of Los Lagos and part of the assessment team.
That’s causing concern that this change in status could divert both conservation funding and attention away from a species that remains at risk of extinction across its range.
“Reclassifying species to a lower threatened status gives the impression that these particular species are doing well and therefore need … less conservation attention,” says Wai-Ming Wong, director of small cat conservation science at Panthera, an NGO. “To divert conservation resources away from that particular species just because it’s being reclassified, I think wouldn’t be the best thing to do.”
The move from vulnerable to least concern
Assigning a species with a status on the IUCN Red List is fundamentally a scientific process. In this case, Galvez says, the weight of evidence points the guiña toward being of least concern. But IUCN listings are often used by other organizations to determine levels of conservation funding.
“Unfortunately, a lot of the time, only the listing of the IUCN Red List is used to set priorities in conservation or even to allocate funding,” explains Tabea Lanz, the IUCN Red List Authority coordinator. “But the IUCN Red List was not built as a priority-setting tool on its own. It is important to consider other factors too.”
This tendency of solely relying on IUCN status for funding decisions is a point of worry for some researchers. But some funding agencies continue tying their grants directly to a species’ assigned threat level.
Tadeu de Oliveira, a reviewer of the recent guiña assessment and a professor at Maranhão State University in Brazil and researcher for the Pró-Carnívoros institute, says he was skeptical of the new listing. But he adds that the data are sound.
The guiña “is deservingly least concern because of the accuracy of new information,” he says. “However, conservation efforts in terms of money to support conservation actions might have a shortfall that could, in the end, affect the species. This would be my major concern.”
Enrique Alfonso Rodriguez Serrano, head of the Mammalogy Lab at the University of Concepcíon, Chile, shares some of these concerns. Serrano recently co-authored a study that offered a tentatively positive outlook for the guiña’s future across its distribution. Past research suggested that climate change and human land use change could reduce the guiña’s habitat by up to 40% by 2050. But Serrano’s paper suggests consideration of other factors, such as prey availability, makes this threat much smaller.
“[P]rey availability is one of the most important predictors of current and future distribution of the guiña,” he explains. But even though his recent analysis offers some hope, he remains cautious about the shift in IUCN status due to the many threats the species faces. He also underlines the need for more “fine details” to assess other threats, such as wildfires, to fill out how the cat’s distribution might change in the near future.
“If you [were to] ask me if we need to change the IUCN status for the guiña, I would say ‘no,’” Serrano explains, as he fears the listing shift may limit conservation funds and attention directed toward the species. “We have only a very basic and opportunistic information and knowledge about the species,” he adds.
Galvez, however, is hopeful the new listing won’t weaken conservation efforts. The guiña remains an iconic species in both Chile and Argentina and is protected under law, he notes.
“There’s a lot of worry that this will reduce the conservation priority of the species,” he says, but then underlines that both the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species and Green List of Protected and Conserved Areas are assessments that analyze a species’ path to recovery and that focus conservation action on populations at risk.
Constanza notes that the Guiña Working Group will prioritize these vulnerable populations in its research and conservation work.
“We need to focus on these very critical populations,” Galvez says. “But we also need to make sure that the populations that are doing very well are protected. Southern Chile is really a safeguard for the species.”
Overall, Galvez says, the new listing is good news. “The species’ numbers are healthier than what we thought before … but there’s still work to do. We can also provide key insight into where we should be prioritizing actions for conservation.”
Banner image: The guiña, a small wildcat species found in Chile and northern Argentina, was recently reassessed and moved to “least concern” on the IUCN Red List. Image courtesy of Sebastian Cisternas/Kithanofilms.
Conservationists aim to save South America’s super tiny wild cat, the guina
Correction (10/11/25): An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that the guiña lives in the Mediterranean-type climate of the Valdivian Forest biodiversity hotspot. It also described the guiña as being “also known as the kodkod,” which a small cat specialist informed Mongabay is inaccurate: “Kodkod” is a mispronunciation of the Indigenous Mapuche word Colocolo, which refers to a different cat species.
Citations :
Cuyckens, G. A., Morales, M. M., & Tognelli, M. F. (2014). Assessing the distribution of a vulnerable felid species: Threats from human land use and climate change to the kodkod Leopardus guigna. Oryx, 49(4), 611-618. doi:10.1017/s003060531300135x
Zamora‐Cornejo, F., Lazo‐Cancino, D., Rivera, R., Musleh, S. S., González, G. P., Hernández, C. E., & Rodríguez‐Serrano, E. (2025). Assessing the importance of prey, climate change, and human footprint for modeling current and future distribution of Leopardus guigna. Conservation Biology, 39(5). doi:10.1111/cobi.70135
FEEDBACK: Use this form to send a message to the author of this post. If you want to post a public comment, you can do that at the bottom of the page.