US Officials Declare Eastern Cougar Extinct

marplots said:
In any case, I'm going to go with the idea that you can legally shoot an extinct animal. Or a space alien. Or bigfoot.
Click to expand...

What if Bigfoot is a Space Alien, and you start an intergalactic war?

Consequences must be thought through before pulling the trigger.
 
Drewbot said:
What if Bigfoot is a Space Alien, and you start an intergalactic war?

Consequences must be thought through before pulling the trigger.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm firmly in the 'take only pictures, leave only footprints' camp regarding Bigfoot, aliens and especially big-footed aliens.
 
William Parcher said:
Mountain lion and cougar are different names for the same species. This thread is about an extinct subspecies called Eastern Cougar.



You are describing what is known as functional extinction. The USFWS has not found evidence for functional extinction, but instead has evidence for extinction itself.



The Eastern Cougar subspecies is extinct and so there aren't any around. That's the whole point about the agency declaring the subspecies to be extinct.

Many millions of people (the citizenry) have had many decades to show that the Eastern Cougar still exists. That has not happened. That matters. It matters a whole lot.

Absence of evidence is evidence of absence.
Click to expand...
Thank you for those clarifications.
 
Arisia said:
Yeah, I'm firmly in the 'take only pictures, leave only footprints' camp regarding Bigfoot, aliens and especially big-footed aliens.
Click to expand...

I'm more of a "how would that taste on a grill" sort.

Interesting that the blame the e.cougar extinction, partially, on the near extinction of white-tail deer in the eastern US circa 1900. I had half a dozen of those nearly extinct deer chewing up the shrubbery this morning.
 
stevea said:
Interesting that the blame the e.cougar extinction, partially, on the near extinction of white-tail deer in the eastern US circa 1900. I had half a dozen of those nearly extinct deer chewing up the shrubbery this morning.
Click to expand...

Yes the recovery of White Tailed Deer is one of the huge success stories of conservation in the 20th century. Most of the extirpation was due to loss of habitat. A good example is southern New England where by the middle of the 19th century nearly all the forest land had been clear cut for farming and timber in the 17th, 18th and early 19th centuries. After the civil war many farms and timber operations were abandoned for better opportunities west of the Mississippi. So state governments especially RI, MA & CT started buying up land and designating it as conservation areas so that the forests would grown again. We're now at the point where many of the locally extirpated species have fully recovered (e.g. deer, beaver, mink) or were successfully re-introduced (e.g. turkey). So now the predator species like the cougar could exist in quite a few areas of southern New England.
 
Last edited:
It would be good if we can reintroduce predator species in a sensible way, since we don't have a strong enough big game hunting culture at this point to keep white-tail deer from overpopulation, especially in southern New England.
 
Arisia said:
It would be good if we can reintroduce predator species in a sensible way, since we don't have a strong enough big game hunting culture at this point to keep white-tail deer from overpopulation, especially in southern New England.
Click to expand...

Over here in the least populated area of the Blackstone Valley, deer hunting is very popular so our local population is kept in decent balance. Although a side effect is that here deer are very skittish and usually run away at the first site or sound of humans. So I hardly ever get to observe them like I did when I lived in more populated areas closer to where you are.

There is some hope that the Coywolf packs will grow and keep the deer in check. It was only a few years ago that a biologist from RI found the first hard proof that Coywolf were pack hunting White Tails in RI.
 
I have lived in four eastern US states in my life, and in each is the perpetual rumor that the "Wildlife Department" brought in cougars to try to "control the deer herd." This is of course pure fantasy. The reality is that in I think 3 of those states, agencies responsible for wildlife management had to reintroduce deer in response to unregulated hunting of whitetails that persisted into the early 20th Century. We humans hunted out predators and prey alike.
 
The high level of reforestation certainly hasn't hurt the rebound of the white-tail population, between that and the decline of the hunting culture in most of the region, solitary-living apex predators like the cougar could stand a chance in the rural sections that remain.
 
Last edited:
I've only ever lived in three Eastern states and for 56 years. I can't recall ever hearing tall tales of cougar introductions but that may be due to intentionally trying to avoid conspiracy minded fools all my life. :)

As I said above, where I currently live in Worcester County their isn't a problem with the population due to careful management and a large supply of hunters. However over in Middlesex County where I lived for from 1975 to 1985 deer are causing a lot of problems. Some towns may end up having to do like some NY towns and hire professional bow hunters to cull the herds.

Cornell University has a good site for their white-tailed deer work. The population page has a good overview of the reality. http://wildlifecontrol.info/deer/Pages/Populations.aspx

If western cougars are able to establish themselves in the Appalachian Mountains of New England I believe they could thrive and would be a welcome addition. If they ever moved into the more populated areas east of the mountains I suspect it will be a large problem that may lead to forceful removal by wildlife management. So far there have been no major problems with Coywolf in New England however there has been a human death in Nova Scotia. So while I believe they may help control the deer population, if they cause too many human deaths I'm sure there will be a call to remove them from south eastern New England.
 
I have lived in NY, MA, and NJ for most of my 61 years, and have heard many tales of the catamount. Most of them are legendary. I do not claim to be an authority, yet it seems to me that the European sort of land use directly conflicts with the viability of pumas. We, as a species, tend to extirpate those varmints, the very prey that pumas prefer. IMHO that's how it goes, and that's why these cats survive where they do.
 
leonAzul said:
I have lived in NY, MA, and NJ for most of my 61 years, and have heard many tales of the catamount. Most of them are legendary. I do not claim to be an authority, yet it seems to me that the European sort of land use directly conflicts with the viability of pumas. We, as a species, tend to extirpate those varmints, the very prey that pumas prefer. IMHO that's how it goes, and that's why these cats survive where they do.
Click to expand...

I too have heard many tales, just not that the government was re-introducing them. There's one particularly persistent guy down in southern Rhode Island who swears he's seen them near coastal Rhode Island dozens of times over the last 40 years. He was ecstatic when that western cougar got killed by a car in western Connecticut a while back, he denies it had migrated from the west and insists it one of the thriving local population :boggled:
 
leonAzul said:
I have lived in NY, MA, and NJ for most of my 61 years, and have heard many tales of the catamount. Most of them are legendary. I do not claim to be an authority, yet it seems to me that the European sort of land use directly conflicts with the viability of pumas. We, as a species, tend to extirpate those varmints, the very prey that pumas prefer. IMHO that's how it goes, and that's why these cats survive where they do.
Click to expand...

I spent many childhood family vacations at VA state parks. The evening talks at the nature centers, especially in the mountains, usually mentioned that there weren't supposed to be mountain lions, but there were always stories. Then it was pointed out that a cattamount sounded like a woman screaming. You could be sure to hear several screams all over the campground lafter in the evening. :jaw-dropp
 
Carlotta said:
I spent many childhood family vacations at VA state parks. The evening talks at the nature centers, especially in the mountains, usually mentioned that there weren't supposed to be mountain lions, but there were always stories. Then it was pointed out that a cattamount sounded like a woman screaming. You could be sure to hear several screams all over the campground lafter in the evening. :jaw-dropp
Click to expand...

Indeed, campfire stories are fun and entertaining, yet in all honesty they say more about the skills of the story teller than any factual merit.
 
Eastern Mountain Lions May Be Extinct, but Locals Still See Them

The article title may be misleading because it says that locals see them instead of saying that locals claim to see them.


Wall Street Journal said:
Diana Marchibroda insists she saw the beast near the Appalachian Trail in Virginia in May. From the woods sauntered a “tall, very sleek” mountain lion, she says. Ms. Marchibroda, a dentist who is 62 years old, says she and her silver-haired miniature schnauzer, Sophie, “both watched in awe.”

“My sighting is ABSOLUTE,” she wrote the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in July. “I know what I saw.”

Dozens of similar missives have poured into the agency as it proposes removing the Eastern mountain lion from the list of endangered species, where it has been since 1973. That change comes because the agency believes the creature no longer exists and would effectively render the subspecies extinct.

The roar of protest is from Easterners who contend the formidable felines still roam forests, fields and backyards from Maine to Georgia.

“There was no mistaking that long tail!” wrote one commenter to the agency in June, about an alleged sighting in New York. “Big as my bike,” promised another about a purported lion in Harrisburg, Pa.

The debate is “sort of in the realm of Bigfoot,” but with more scientific basis, says Noah Charney, an expert animal tracker in Western Massachusetts. The occasional mountain lion is spotted in the East, after wandering in from the West, but it is exceedingly uncommon and officials say people are reporting far more sightings than technically possible...


...“We’ve looked and looked,” says Mark McCollough, an endangered species biologist who led the cougar study for the Fish and Wildlife Service, which in June proposed to “delist” the Eastern mountain lion from the roster of endangered species. “This is not something we do gladly or feel good about.” This is touchy terrain. The demise of the Eastern cougar is a long-running topic that has stirred a “whole cougar phenomenon” of bloggers, wildlife enthusiasts and even tricksters endeavoring to prove otherwise, says Mr. McCollough.

“I can’t think of any other animal that has captured the imagination of the public in the way that the Eastern cougar has,” he says...
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom