more New England mountain lion rumors

[Tom Rankin]

That's just it; there is NO evidence. I know a biologist who goes out on these calls, and most of the time it's someone's golden retriever. Escaped "pets" are out there, Eastern Mountain lions are not, yet.

I'm sure there are some:

• A__ holes
• Bob cats
• Crack pots
• Dogs ( Golden retrievers? )
• Everything else

out there, but I'm also sure there are:

• For real sightings.

Even if your acquaintance has never seen a mountain lion on one of his/her calls, it does not invalidate the rest of the claims.

 

[johnranta]

To be or not to be?

I've been following mountain lion rumors and sightings for the past 15 years or so, since I spent some time studying tracking with Paul Rezendes and Nick Wisniewski, 20 years ago. Two things I learned, and one distinction.

Two things learned:
1. There are many, many reports of mountains lions in New England every year. The vast majority of these do not pan out, for a variety of reasons. People who see something are excited, are inexperienced, do not know the difference between a bobcat and a puma, etc. There are/were a group of us who follow up on reports, check evidence (if there is any), and try to figure out what was seen. One "I'm sure it was a mountain lion" I checked out in Princeton MA 10 years ago must have been wearing coyote boots, because those are the tracks it left.

2. Confirmation requires hard evidence - video or clear photographs (there are very few photos and almost none are clear, such as the one that started this thread - it is out of focus and poorly lit, does not show the body and tail, does not provide scale, etc), scat (w/DNA), a carcass, clear observation by a trained wildlife biologist, etc. That said, there have been a half dozen confirmed sightings over the past 15-20 years in New England - DNA from a scat found in the Quabbin (McWhorter), DNA from Cape Elizabeth ME, a confirmed sighting by a wildlife biologist in Vermont, and a couple of others I'm forgetting. So there is hard evidence that mountain lions have been here in New England in the past 15 years.

The distinction:
Escaped (or released) pets are not a native population. They do not represent a population that is growing, breeding and establishing its habitat. Escaped pets are very likely to struggle to survive, and die after a short time, without breeding.

I'd love there to be a wild population of mountain lions in New England. As others have pointed out, the ingredients are there - extensive forested landscape, and a well (white-tailed deer) stocked larder. We've seen other species return to broad swaths of southern and central New England (moose, black bear) after being absent from those places for 150 years. But moose and black bear spread south from pockets of surviving populations in northern ME and eastern Canada. There's no close-by surviving pocket of mountain lions that I know of. The closest confirmed native populations are in the upper midwest, and north-eastern Canada.

Until we've got more proof, especially of a breeding population, I'll remain hopeful but skeptical. And looking forward to the next posting on this site, just in case. JR

 

[funkyfreddy]

Thanks JR for your post. 12 years ago I was told by rangers in Quebec's Gaspe Peninsula that their were mountain lions there and in New Brunswick, but the lack of physical evidence makes me wonder at times....

I would think we would see more evidence such as road kill, etc, if there was a breeding population in the Northeast. My mind is open though....

 

[el-bagr]

Thanks JR for your post. 12 years ago I was told by rangers in Quebec's Gaspe Peninsula that their were mountain lions there and in New Brunswick, but the lack of physical evidence makes me wonder at times....

I would think we would see more evidence such as road kill, etc, if there was a breeding population in the Northeast. My mind is open though....

Tangible evidence of lions in Quebec and New Brunswick:

http://www.easterncougarnet.org/QuebecPR-corrections.htm

 

[Maddy]

This appears to be an informative web site with very interesting links. Scan down to responses to see part 2
http://www.masslive.com/forums/outdoors/index.ssf?artid=5954

and more
http://www.recorder.com/story.cfm?id_no=4900943

 

[erugs]

Report of Mountain Lion - Owl's Head Maine

From the Village Soup newspaper: http://knox.villagesoup.com/news/story/mountain-lion-reported-in-owls-head/342801

Owl's Head is located on the Maine coast near Rockland, north of Boothbay, south of Bar Harbor.

 

[rup]

Interesting story:

http://discovermagazine.com/2010/the-brain/04-stages-fear-attacked-mountain-lion-edition

 

[erugs]

That's a fabulous story. Should be the beginning of a new thread on how we face our fears! Thanks for sharing, Rup.

 

[DougPaul]

http://discovermagazine.com/2010/the-brain/04-stages-fear-attacked-mountain-lion-edition

Nice link. Not something I wish to experience myself...

I have read of bear spray being used to (successfully) defend against a cougar.

Doug

 

[erugs]

I saw my cousin from Rockland, Maine yesterday and asked him about the cougar siting not far from his home. He told me that a friend of his in the area saw a moose crossing their long driveway and looked to see if their was a calf, too. Instead he saw two cougar kittens!

 

[Mac]

Nova Scotia cougar attack report

I've never heard of a cougar report in NS.

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/nova-scotia/story/2010/08/24/ns-horses-attacked-video.html

 

[Maddy]

From the Village Soup newspaper: http://knox.villagesoup.com/news/story/mountain-lion-reported-in-owls-head/342801

Owl's Head is located on the Maine coast near Rockland, north of Boothbay, south of Bar Harbor.[/QUOTE

Could you share a bit about the article. You have to pay a hefty fee to subscribe or they wont allow you to read it.

 

[erugs]

From the Village Soup newspaper: http://knox.villagesoup.com/news/story/mountain-lion-reported-in-owls-head/342801

...Could you share a bit about the article. You have to pay a hefty fee to subscribe or they wont allow you to read it.

I can read entire stories while the issues are current, but cannot access them with a search unless I pay. I didn't realize that! I tried unsuccessfully to find another source. My cousin who lives in Rockland may have access to a paper copy and I can ask him, if you like, Maddy. I'm not sure how quickly he recycles. If he's like me, he won't still have it. If he's like my dad, we got months to make our request.

 

[Maddy]

I can read entire stories while the issues are current, but cannot access them with a search unless I pay. I didn't realize that! I tried unsuccessfully to find another source. My cousin who lives in Rockland may have access to a paper copy and I can ask him, if you like, Maddy. I'm not sure how quickly he recycles. If he's like me, he won't still have it. If he's like my dad, we got months to make our request.

Thanks....that would be great. I like reading anything that relates to mountain lions!

 

[sardog1]

Minnesota officials confirm five sightings of cougars

From the Minneapolis StarTribune yesterday:

"State wildlife officials have confirmed five sightings of mountain lions in Minnesota over the past 13 months, leading at least one state hunting group to set up a reporting system aimed at collecting more data on the big predators.

"Wildlife officials say the mountain lions in Minnesota -- including three in the past two months that were photographed by remote trail cameras near Littlefork, Two Harbors and Ortonville, and one that was hit and killed by a car near Bemidji last year -- likely are young males wandering in from the Black Hills of South Dakota. It's unlikely, they say, Minnesota has a resident population of the cats."

There's more detail in the linked article.

EDIT: Note for you non-Gophers -- Littlefork is more than 300 miles from Ortonville, which is on the MN--SD border. Two Harbors (on the North Shore of Lake Superior -- along the Superior Hiking Trail ) is just shy of 300 miles from Ortonville.

 

[el-bagr]

From Saturday's Bangor Daily News: "Biologist doubts Maine cougar sightings".

I find the reader comment section especially interesting: lots of first-hand tales of encounters.

 

[funkyfreddy]

http://www.bangordailynews.com/stor...tatus-remains-in-doubt,160602?ref=mostReadBox

 

[erugs]

That was an interesting story. What I'd like to know is, if "Wildlife officials know the actual number of captive cougars is likely much higher because some people own the cats illegally" (quoted in the story) how do they know people do own cougars without license, and if they do know it, why don't they do something about it?

 

[Lawn Sale]

From the Village Soup newspaper: http://knox.villagesoup.com/news/story/mountain-lion-reported-in-owls-head/342801

Owl's Head is located on the Maine coast near Rockland, north of Boothbay, south of Bar Harbor.

I live in Waldoboro, which is about 10 miles from Rockland, and I grew up in Warren, which is even closer. I have seen a mountain lion in Warren, as have some of my friends, and there has been evidence taken that proves there is a mountain lion, or several, in the area. The wardens, until one is shot, are highly skeptical despite hundreds of sightings and other evidence, such as hair and tracks.

It's normalized here now, if you ask people in the area, they'll tell you the same thing, but it's no longer something to get excited about. There hasn't been a problem and people tend to have more pressing things to be concerned about.

A similar thing happened with the wolf that was shot a few years ago, the state was adamant there were no wolves in Maine, so they sent the carcass to Colorado for identification, where it was confirmed to be a wolf. The hunter was fined heavily despite thinking it was a coyote. I never heard what happened on the appeal.

I used to teach Hunter Safety for the State of Maine, and while most working for the State are good folks, it does not surprise me at all they'd keep denying there are mountain lions in the area.

 

[johnranta]

demonizing state wildlife workers...

By coincidence, this weekend I attended a presentation by a UNH wildlife biologist (from this project - http://mlitvaitis.unh.edu/Research/BobcatWeb/bobcats.htm), on bobcats. He has spent thousands of hours in the woods over the past several years, with a team of grad students and state fish & game officials, gathering data on bobcats. It was a great talk.

Of course, during the Q&A, the subject of mountain lions came up. He said that neither he nor his team had found any solid evidence (scat, tracks, hair, clear photos, or a carcass) of mountain lions in New Hampshire. But he went on to say that he considered the biggest argument against the existence of a wild mountain lion population in New Hampshire (and Maine) to be the lack of a nearby population of wild mountain lions as a source. Before he got his PhD at UNH, he studied bobcats in Iowa. There he used to hear of, and find, evidence of mountain lions wandering through the state, pushed to Iowa from the Dakotas (where there's a native population). He said that with no nearby wild population (the closest being the UP of Michigan) there's no place for wild New Hampshire mountain lions to be pushed from. Given what he knows about wildlife behavior, this makes the possibility of wild mountain lions in New Hampshire to be close to zero.

His was a convincing argument. Taking his point - if there are mountain lions in Maine and New Hampshire they are released pets. If whatever we are talking about here are released pets, how does that change this conversation? How do we go about about dealing with mountain lions as released pets?

When state wildlife guys tell us something we don't want to hear, there may be no conspiracy behind it, it may have nothing to do with "Big Brother" behavior. They may just be giving us their honest, professional opinions. jr