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US Officials Declare Eastern Cougar Extinct

The platypus is the one which isn't extinct.
 

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The announcement seems like it will muddy the waters, not clarify them. The folks claiming cougar sightings are not reporting eastern cougars, just cougars that happen to be in the East. There's nothing here to refute the sightings people report, only the specification that the cougars people do report in the East are of western or other stock.
 
The Shrike said:
The announcement seems like it will muddy the waters, not clarify them. The folks claiming cougar sightings are not reporting eastern cougars, just cougars that happen to be in the East. There's nothing here to refute the sightings people report, only the specification that the cougars people do report in the East are of western or other stock.
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Well, muddy waters is not the real concern here of people back east. This blog shares some of the concerns. It's a lot to read, and not well written, so, to summarize, with the cougar delisted they are concerned that there is no more protection for the species. They want to repopulate the cougar population of the east, and are concerned that now the cougar will have no federal level protection. They are also bickering about whether it was a true subspecies or not. Don't ask me what a 'true' subspecies is - places like here claim there is no way to distinguish the subspecies, but I find their claims dubious. The fact that is is hard to visually identify a subspecies in the woods doesn't mean that a subspecies doesn't exist. On the DNA front I have no comment because it is not my field.

I haven't read enough to really understand all of this, nor will I (life is short). I'm not sure if they are right or not. If only this subspecies was on the endangered list, then I guess their concerns make sense. If, on the other hand, several subspecies or the entire species is on the endangered list, then the cougar in general will still be protected. I dunno.

Anyway, we should expect to see this play out over the next several years to decades in the political and environmental fronts.
 
roger said:
. . . with the cougar delisted they are concerned that there is no more protection for the species. . .
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Sure, but that kind of rings hollow considering the expansion of western cougars (from hunted populations) into the eastern U.S. If western cougars dispersing to the East fail to establish a breeding population, my money would be on road mortality as the culprit, not hunting pressure.
 
According to the report PARCHER posted in post #4:

1. They are concerned that there is no way to distinguish between E. and W. cougars genetically.

2. They talk about Western cougars moving in from Canada and the plains states, as though they will 'repopulate' the Eastern ranges. So this tells me that they consider them to be one species and not a bunch of subspecies.

Unrelated to the report:

3. CITES lists 3 P. concolor on their list. Go here http://www.natureserve.org/explorer/servlet/NatureServe?init=Species
Type in cougar, and check 'common name' then search.

1. Puma concolor, which is shown as distributed throughout the former range of the E. cougar, perhaps they are saying they are all one species.

2. Puma concolor couguar, (eastern cougar), which is shown as basically extirpated from the ranges.

3. Puma concolor (population #1) this is how future cougars will probably be recognized, I think. a Cougar found east of the Mississippi, will probably be labeled Cougar from pop.#1, and those west will be pop#2, and perhaps Florida will be labeled Pop. #3, S. America #4 etc...
 
Mark6 said:
What does "s.t.a.u.n.c.h." stand for?
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It's how you spell staunch. From one of the greatest documentaries in the history of filmmaking.

"In dealing with me, the relatives didn't know that they were dealing with a staunch character. And I tell you if there's anything worse than a staunch woman... S.T.A.U.N.C.H. There's nothing worse. I'm telling you. They don't weaken - no matter what. But they didn't know that. Wow, what they didn't know..."

Little Edie Bouvier Beale in Grey Gardens.
 

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William Parcher said:
The similarity is that many people insist that it exists without any functional evidence. There is also a similarity in that people do intentionally hoax evidence for Eastern Cougar.
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Or the western ones just moved east, is that so unlikely, Parcher?
 
William Parcher said:
Eastern Cougars and "panthers" have long been a topic of skepticism. You can find discussions about them here on JREF and on cryptozoology sites and forums. The article is significant because the government is officially saying no.
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to keep from having to move funds from pet project to fund protection for something alledgedly isnt there.
 
William Parcher said:
It's really pretty amazing and unprecedented in modern times. A large North American animal is declared extinct by the government and many hundreds, if not thousands of citizens say they are wrong.

They are saying that the Eastern Cougar is not extinct because: they have seen them or know somebody who has seen them, photographed or filmed them, seen tracks or poop or other sign, killed them or found dead, found evidence of their predation on other animals, etc.

But nobody has produced any confirmatory evidence that the animal is not extinct. That is all it would have taken and yet... nothing.

This Yahoo News article has more information and over 3,500 comments. Many of those comments are folks saying that the Eastern Cougar is not extinct for various reasons. The web is full of forums, blogs and articles with great numbers of people saying the cat isn't extinct.
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you oversimplify and you routinely do, I for one, am not advocating eastern cougars, its more like cougars are in the east, they are out there. They may have simply come east, but they are here, despite Parcher's usual sarcasm and condescension
 
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quarky said:
I wonder how cougars cross the Mississippi river?
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There are a number of possible ways.

Swim
Cross on a bridge
Cross on ice

Q: Does the Mississippi River ever completely freeze over, or do the locks prevent that from happening? If it ever has frozen over, when did that happen?

A: According to Roald Tweet, a retired English professor at Augustana College, Rock Island, and noted local historian who has written extensively about the river, the Mississippi River has indeed frozen over many times throughout history, but not in recent memory. Tweet said he believes that in 1853, a train actually slid onto the ice to unload its cargo onto a barge.
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However, the river does act as a natural barrier. You can see this by looking at the cougar map...
 

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The Shrike said:
Sure, but that kind of rings hollow considering the expansion of western cougars (from hunted populations) into the eastern U.S. If western cougars dispersing to the East fail to establish a breeding population, my money would be on road mortality as the culprit, not hunting pressure.
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It wouldn't be, and presently isn't, roadkill or hunting - it's lack of females. There is a distinct differential in dispersion away from established breeding populations based on gender. Females don't wander/roam.

It makes no difference how many males cross the Mississippi River as a consequence of their wandering. Without any females, there cannot be an expansion of anything other than desperate horny young males who ain't gonna get any tail.
 
mikeyx said:
...I for one, am not advocating eastern cougars, its more like cougars are in the east, they are out there.
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So, you aren't saying there are cougars in the eastern U.S., you're just saying that there are cougars in the eastern U.S.?
 
Of course there are cougars in the eastern U.S.
They are evidently refugees from a different sort of cougar-dem.

Eventually, Darwin willing, these western cougars in the east will become eastern cougars.
That's what I love about science.
 
Foster Zygote said:
So, you aren't saying there are cougars in the eastern U.S., you're just saying that there are cougars in the eastern U.S.?
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Im saying that you dont need to make the case for a native Eastern population, they can migrate from elsewhere, and they have. They are here. Deal with it.
 
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