Pittsburg Post Gazette, PA
11-05-06
Outdoors: Game Commission to track mountain lion sighting amind flood of
reports
By Ben Moyer
The accomplished outdoorsman stood at the ammunition counter at Woodlands
World in Uniontown and told his story. He is not the kind of man who brags about
his outdoor exploits. He has donated many hours to conservation work and, as a
skilled fly fisherman, is a keen observer of the natural world.
He said he had been hunting deer in a northern county, many years ago, and
had sat down on a log near a beaver dam to rest.
"That's when I saw it. It jumped up on the beaver dam and sat there on its
haunches. It was brown," he said, "but I knew it couldn't be a deer. After a while it
jumped off the dam and loped toward me. It's tail was this long."
As he spoke, he stretched out his arms to a span of three feet.
"When it finally winded me or saw me, it wheeled around on its hind feet and
disappeared into a dense stand of pine, the kind the CCC camps planted back in
the 1930c.
"I know what I saw, and I saw a mountain lion."
Later, pumping gas for the trip home he encountered the local game protector
(now known as wildlife conservation officers. "I told him what I'd seen but he
gave me no respect," the man said. "I've never felt right about that."
Credible outdoor people in his situation may get that missing respect from the
Pennsylvania Game Commission in the future. The agency announced recently
that it would start a formal system for keeping track of mountain lion reports. Lion
sightings have originated from all parts of the state and have become more
frequent than ever this year.
"This year, more than at any time I can recall, there has been an ungodly amount
of mountain lion sightings," wildlife management bureau director Cal DuBrock
told game commissioners at the agency's meeting last month.
According to the Harrisburg Patriot-News the new system will collect information
in a uniform way from everyone reporting a sighting.
"We're not looking for more accounts. We are looking for more credible
accounts," DuBrock said.
Mountain lions, also known as cougars, panthers and pumas, are native to
Pennsylvania but are believed to have become extinct in the state by early in the
20th century. Originally, cougars had the widest range of any mammal in the
western hemisphere, ranging from northern Canada, throughout the United
States and Mexico, all the way to Tierra del Fuego at South America's southern
tip. Across that expanse they exploited a wide range of habitats -- forest, desert,
grassland and swamp.
Pennsylvania isn't alone in its extermination of native lions. With the exception of
one remnant population in southern Florida, the cats were wiped out throughout
the eastern and central United States. Healthy populations remain in the Rocky
Mountains and the Black Hills of South Dakota.
Panthers prey on a wide range of small mammals and birds but deer are their
favorite quarry. The resurgence of deer herds, including near urban centers, is
one of the reasons some biologists believe the mountain lion could be
rebounding across its old haunts.
In August 2002, a car struck and killed a mountain lion near fragmented forest
habitat in central Iowa and wildlife officials believe there may now be a dozen or
more lions living in that state.
Some farmers and deer hunters accused Iowa's Department of Natural
Resources of importing lions to control deer herds. But Ron Andrews, a furbearer
resource specialist with the Iowa DNR denied such a move.
"We did not, we have not and we will not release mountain lions in Iowa,"
Andrews wrote in an official statement.
Pennsylvania Game Commission officials remain skeptical about the presence of
wild, reproducing lions in the Keystone State, often suggesting that escaped
captive cougars are the source of credible reports here. But the Eastern Puma
Research Network in Maysville, W.Va., which investigates cougar reports east of
the Rockies, has logged more than 1,400 sightings in Pennsylvania, more than
any other eastern state and far more than the known number of captive big cats.
Because of extensive forests, rugged terrain and abundant deer, the Eastern
Puma Research Network considers mountainous sections of Pennsylvania, West
Virginia, Virginia and western Maryland to be the most likely location for an
eastern cougar rebound.
Compared to intensively farmed Iowa, the region would appear ideal for the
elusive species.
"The fact that species like mountain lions, bears and wolves can show up here in
Iowa is pretty significant," said James Dinsmore, an animal ecology professor
at Iowa State University. "If these species can come back into Iowa and find a
way to survive here, they ought to be able to survive almost anyplace in North
America."