Local extinction of Southern California mountain lions possible within 50 years

March 20, 2019, UC Davis

Two isolated mountain lion populations in southern California's Santa Ana and Santa Monica Mountains are at risk of local extinction, perhaps as soon as within 50 years, according to a study published in the journal Ecological Applications.

The study showed the extinction risk is due to low genetic diversity and mortality that affects the stability of the population. Mountain lion mortality is often caused by humans, but can also result from changes in the environment, such as wildfire and fluctuations in prey density.

The two mountain lion populations in the human-dominated landscape of southern California are isolated by freeways and development. For the study, lead author John Benson of the University of Nebraska and co-authors at UCLA, the University of California, Davis, the National Park Service, the University of Washington, Northern Arizona University, and the University of Wyoming used population viability modeling to predict the possibilities of extinction from genetic and demographic risk factors.

"It's easy to read our paper as yet another pessimistic story about wildlife threatened by human actions—and in a sense that is true," said Benson. "However, there is also a more optimistic message in that our model predicted that these populations can persist with relatively modest increases in landscape connectivity. If we can maintain healthy populations of mountain lions—a species that roams widely and requires such large spaces—here in greater Los Angeles, that bodes well for our ability to conserve large carnivores anywhere."

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Genetics of California mountain lions: Research to inform future conservation

Date:  December 21, 2018

Source:  University of Wyoming

Fragmentation of wildlife populations is increasing on a global scale, and understanding current genetic structure, genetic diversity and genetic connectivity is key to informing future wildlife management and conservation.

This is true of mountain lion -- also known as pumas or cougars -- populations in California, according to a new study conducted by a University of Wyoming research team.

"Large expanses of continuous habitat provide populations the opportunity to maintain large numbers of gene variants, called alleles. This is analogous to a deck of cards. If you have 40 cards, you are capable of harboring more types of cards than if you had 10," says Kyle Gustafson, an assistant professor of genetics in the Department of Biology and Environmental Health at Missouri Southern State University, but who started this work in Holly Ernest's Wildlife Genomics and Disease Ecology Lab at UW. "When populations get isolated, like many of the puma populations surrounded by urbanization, the only way for them to maintain a large number of alleles is through migration. Otherwise, natural selection and genetic drift will ultimately lead to genetic uniformity (fixation) and mating among related individuals (inbreeding)."

The new study, titled "Genetic Source-Sink Dynamics Among Naturally Structured and Anthropogenically Fragmented Puma Populations," was published Dec. 10 in Conservation Genetics, a journal that promotes the conservation of biodiversity by providing a forum for data and ideas, aiding the further developments of this area of study. Contributions include work from the disciplines of population genetics, molecular ecology, molecular biology, evolutionary biology, systematics and forensics.

Read  more  

Why alligators, wolves and mountain lions are turning up in odd places

24 October 2018

Predators are thriving in places they shouldn't, revealing some serious misunderstandings about their behaviour and how to protect them

By Isabelle Groc

WHEN Brian Silliman found himself face to face with an alligator, he thought he was seeing a ghost. It was night and he was knee deep in mud in a salt marsh in Georgia, searching for crabs and snails. Alligators are freshwater reptiles, so Silliman was not expecting to come across one, but the pair of red eyes watching him was unmistakably real. Thinking fast, he shook a cage between him and the predator to scare it away. “That freaked me out,” he says.

The next morning, haunted by the encounter, Silliman, a conservation biologist at Duke University, North Carolina, couldn’t stop wondering why the alligator was in the salt marsh. Returning to the site, he spotted more of them – and they seemed to be right at home. Diving into the scientific literature, he discovered that alligators are not the only predators found thriving in places where they are not supposed to live. It was a light-bulb moment. “I started re-evaluating everything I had been taught about large animals,” he says.

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Mountain lions often lose to wolves and bears, study finds

by Shreya Dasgupta on 6 February 2018

When the hunting grounds of pumas overlap with those of other top predators, such as wolves, bears and jaguars, pumas are often the losers, a new study has found.

The findings from the study, a review of existing scientific literature, are especially important given how pumas are still being intensively hunted over much of their range in a bid to reduce conflicts with people and livestock, researchers say.

In some puma habitats where wolves and brown bears are recolonizing and recovering, wildlife managers need to be cautious about hunting limits for pumas, the authors write.

The large, secretive puma (Puma concolor) may be at the top of its food chain, but it is not always the king of its territory.

Native to the Americas, the puma, also called the mountain lion, cougar, catamount or panther, often shares its habitat with several other top predators, such as wolves, bears, coyotes and jaguars. But when the hunting grounds of these predators overlap, the puma is often the loser, researchers report in a new study published in PeerJ.

By reviewing the scientific literature on competition between pumas and other predators, researchers have found that wolves, grizzly bears, black bears and jaguars often dominate pumas. In fact, pumas are subordinate to at least one other top carnivore in 47.5 percent of their range across North and South America. In turn, pumas seem to be dominant only over coyotes and maned wolves.

Continued  

Mountain lions fear humans, fleeing when they hear our voices, new study reveals

Fearful encounters reduce feeding time, driving up predation on deer in human-dominated landscapes

 

Date: June 20, 2017

Source: University of California - Santa Cruz

"Fraidy cat" isn't the way most people think of mountain lions, but when it comes to encounters with humans, perhaps they should.

New research into the behavior of these big cats indicates that they don't like encountering humans any more than we like bumping into them on hiking trails. The findings are particularly valuable as human development encroaches on lion habitat and drives up the number of human-puma encounters.

"We exposed pumas in the Santa Cruz mountains to the sound of human voices to see if they would react with fear and flee, and the results were striking: They were definitely afraid of humans," said Justine Smith, lead author of the paper "Fear of the human 'super predator' reduces feeding time in large carnivores," published in the June 21 online edition of the Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

Continued  

A lion tale: Humans cause most mountain lion deaths in Southern California

Genetic hopes of the population may rely on one lady lion

Date:July 15, 2015

Source:University of California - Davis

Summary:A 13-year study combined genetic and demographic data to determine that even though hunting mountain lions is prohibited in California, humans caused more than half the known deaths of mountain lions studied.

The biggest threat to Southern California mountain lions is us, confirms a comprehensive 13-year study of the population's mortality and survival from the University of California, Davis.

The study, published in the journal PLOS ONE, combined genetic and demographic data to determine that even though hunting mountain lions is prohibited in California, humans caused more than half the known deaths of mountain lions studied. Most were killed through vehicle collisions, depredation permits, illegal shootings, public-safety removals or human-caused wildfire. Annual survival rates were only about 56 percent.

Exacerbating the problem is an interstate highway, I-15, a major thoroughfare connecting San Bernardino, Riverside and San Diego counties that has proven nearly impossible for the mountain lions to cross. It bisects the study area, which stretches from Orange County, south to the Mexican border and east to the Salton Sea. Crossing the interstate, especially for the animals of breeding age, is important for this population's declining genetic diversity -- and long-term health and survival.

Continued ...

California's pumas threatened by urbanisation

Mountain lions in southern California are facing an uncertain future as urbanisation forces them to live in isolated groups, and suffer a severe loss of genetic diversity.

Scientists from the University of California’s Davis School of Veterinary Medicine carried out genetic sampling of 354 mountain lions, or pumas, across California, including 97 from the southern part of the state.

They found pumas in the Santa Ana Mountains lived in what is an essentially isolated area and displayed lower genetic diversity than those from nearly every other region in the state.

This is because say the scientists their range is surrounded by urbanisation and a growing population of about 20 million people. The range is linked with the Peninsular Range via a small wildlife corridor, but pumas avoid it as it is bisects a busy 10-lane highway and is associated human development – hardly incentives to venture there.

Continued ...

Go West, Young Lion: New Study Shows Mountain Lions Dispersing from Nevada to California

ScienceDaily (Oct. 5, 2012) — Using data collected over the course of seven years, the study looked at DNA in tissue samples collected from 739 mountain lions. In the first-of-its-kind study at this scale, the authors used only the gathered genetic information to discover population structures and history, and to identify what areas in the region serve as "sinks" (habitat that animals move to at a greater rate than they disperse from) and "sources" (areas that animals disperse from at a greater rate to live elsewhere).

The study, "Identification of Source-Sink Dynamics in Mountain Lions of the Great Basin" appears online in August's early-view edition of the journal Molecular Ecology. Authors of the study include: Alyson M. Andreasen of the University of Nevada; Jon P. Beckmann of WCS; and Matthew L. Forester, William S. Longland, and Kelley M. Stewart of the University of Nevada.

Continued:  http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/10/121009093231.htm

Deadly Cat Disease: Effective Treatment for Bobcat Fever

ScienceDaily (Apr. 18, 2012) — Lone Star ticks, which are notorious carriers of many diseases including cytauxzoonosis, or "bobcat fever," have been spreading across the nation in recent years. As a result, cats across much of the country are now exposed to the deadly disease. University of Missouri veterinarian Leah Cohn, a small animal disease expert, and Adam Birkenheuer from North Carolina State University, have found an effective treatment for the dangerous disease.

"Previous treatment methods have only been able to save less than 25 percent of infected cats, but our method, which is now being used by veterinarians across the country, has been shown to save about 60 percent of infected cats," Cohn said. "While that number isn't as high as we'd like due to the deadly nature of the disease, our method is the first truly effective way to combat the disease."

Routinely carried by bobcats and mountain lions, Cohn and Birkenheuer also found that bobcat fever can even infect tigers. All types of cats, but only cats, can catch bobcat fever. Cohn calls the disease the "Ebola virus for cats," saying that it is a very quick and painful death for cats that succumb from the infection. Bobcat fever is easily spread between cats through tick bites, but Cohn and Birkenheuer found that the disease is not readily passed down through birth like malaria and many other protozoan diseases.

Continued:  http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/04/120418162258.htm

Mountain lion killed in Conn. traced to S. Dakota

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — A mountain lion killed on a Connecticut highway last month had apparently walked halfway across the country from South Dakota, according to Connecticut environmental officials who said Tuesday that the journey of roughly 2,000 miles was one of the longest ever recorded for a land mammal.


The animal originated in the Black Hills region of South Dakota and was tracked by DNA from its hair and droppings as it passed through Minnesota and Wisconsin in 2009 and 2010, Connecticut Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Commissioner Daniel Esty said at a news conference.
Biologists estimate the size of the mountain lion population at about 100,000 in North America, mostly living in western regions and seldom traveling more than 100 miles. It was the first confirmed wild mountain lion in Connecticut in more than 100 years.


"It is a testament to the adaptability of the species that it can travel so far from its original home in South Dakota to Connecticut," Esty said.

The lean, 140-pound male was killed June 11 when it was hit by a sport utility vehicle at night on the Wilbur Cross Parkway in the New Haven suburb of Milford.

Authorities initially believed it was a captive animal that escaped, but tests showed that it was not neutered or declawed and it had no implanted microchips, which are commonly used in domestic animals.

Tests also determined it was likely the same one that had been seen earlier in Greenwich, Conn., a New York City suburb 30 miles away. The death was followed by a flurry of big cat sightings in the suburbs of Connecticut, but experts dismissed most of them as unreliable. Government experts say no native mountain lions are believed to live in Connecticut.

Although it was an anomaly, Esty said the presence of the wild mountain lion is a good sign of the ability of Connecticut's conserved land to sustain wildlife.


He said the discovery is "a strong symbol of what we had all hoped for who work in the conservation area, that wilderness areas and biological diversity can be preserved and protected."

Genetic testing showed the cat had the same genetic structure of the mountain lion population in South Dakota's Black Hills region. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Forest Service Wildlife Genetics Laboratory in Missoula, Mont., matched the DNA with samples collected from a cat that was spotted in eastern Minnesota near Minneapolis and in northern Wisconsin from late 2009 through early 2010.

It was unclear what route the animal took to Connecticut. Biologists said it could have traveled south near urban areas or north through Canada.

STEPHEN DOCKERY

From Associated Press
http://my.earthlink.net/article/us?guid=20110726/92bd9334-ef54-410a-9dd2-58b0a74d8d92

Two More Mountain Lion Sightings Reported

Two More Mountain Lion Sightings Reported

June 15, 201
By KIM VELSEY
The Hartford Courant

GREENWICH — Officials continue to receive reports of mountain lion sightings since one was struck by a car and killed on the Wilbur Cross Parkway in Milford Saturday. But there's no new evidence to substantiate the sightings, officials say.

On Wednesday, two more residents reported seeing a mountain lion in Greenwich. The first report came in at noon, when a woman told the state Department of Environmental Protection that she was walking her dog on Lake Avenue by the New York border when a mountain lion being chased by two dogs ran in front of her.

Several hours later, an employee of the Fairview Golf Course on King Street reported seeing a mountain lion on a stone wall between the golf course and the Audubon property.

No evidence was found at either site, according to the DEP.

In the absence of any concrete proof of additional mountain lions, the DEP continues to believe that the animal killed in Milford was and is the only one in the state. The DEP believes that the mountain lion killed by a car was a captive that was released or escaped. It is illegal for a private individual to buy or keep a mountain lion in Connecticut and the Environmental Conservation Police Division is conducting a criminal investigation into the matter.

Wednesday's unconfirmed sightings in Greenwich follow three others. Two were reported on Sunday, the first by a motorist on North Street near the Merritt Parkway, and the second by a homeowner on John Street, whose property abuts the Audubon Center property. The DEP referred to another reported sighting on Monday as a "false alarm."

Despite a number of reported sightings over the years (the state receives 10 to 12 unconfirmed reports a year), the DEP says that there are no native mountain lions in Connecticut; the Eastern mountain lion was declared extinct in March by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

The DEP will perform genetic testing on the Milford mountain lion to try to determine where it came from. In addition to DNA testing, a necropsy will be performed, looking for proof of a domestic diet or vaccinations. Spokesman Dwayne Gardner said results from the necropsy probably will be released in about a week.

http://articles.courant.com/2011-06-15/news/hc-mountain-lion-sightings-0616-20110615_1_audubon-center-property-mountain-lion-dna-testing

DEP: Dead Mountain Lion Was Held In Captivity

DEP: Dead Mountain Lion Was Held In Captivity
Officials believe only one wild cat has been stalking region.

Barbara Heins and Ronald DeRosa
June 13, 2011

The state Department of Environmental Protection's police unit is investigating whether a mountain lion killed on the Merritt Parkway in Milford over the weekend escaped from illegal captivity — despite the fact that the animal had no physical signs of being domesticated.

"Our division is actively investigating this case as a violation of Connecticut laws," said Lt. Kyle Overturf, of the state Environmental Conservation Police. "We really need the public's help on this case to follow the origins of this animal."

A mountain lion was killed on the Merritt Parkway Saturday morning after being struck by an SUV. This followed previous reports of sightings in Greenwich, some 40 miles away. DEP officials have said they believe it is the same animal even though they acknowledged they are continuing to receive reported mountain lion sightings, including two on Sunday in northern Greenwich.

During a conference call with reporters on Monday, DEP Deputy Commissioner Susan Frechette said her department is actively working to determine the origin of the slain animal recovered from the highway accident on the Wilbur Cross Parkway. She said the department also is conducting tests and analyzing paw prints and scat samples from other sightings, as well as working to collaborating with the New York Department of Environmental Conservation and research institutions in Florida and California.

"We do continue to state that there is no native population of mountain lions in Connecticut," Frechette said. She said residents in the Greenwich area and in the state should use precaution, by keeping small animals and children inside and applying "common sense" safety tips like not leaving dog or cat food outside.

Anyone who sees anything that looks like a mountain lion should call the DEP hotline at 860-424-3333, Frechette said.

Meanwhile, Overturf said his department is trying to determine whether the 140-pound male mountain lion came from a domestic situation either New York or within Connecticut. Noting that it is a crime to possess a wild animal in Connecticut, Overturf said several state agencies are corroborating with New York environmental officials to determine this animal's origin and is actively any pursuing leads that arise.

"Right now we have no permit mountain lions in Connecticut," Overturf said. "There are two permitted in New York and (EnCon police in New York) are following a lead there. Other than that we have no other lead right now."

In response to reporters' questions DEP Biologist Paul Rego said there was no actual physical indication the animal was in captive. He said the male animal was not neutered, had no collar, was not declawed and was, through a "cursory examination," a lean mountain lion. Rego noted that, more often, animals held in captivity or domestic situations are usually "out of shape."

In fact, the primary reason why the DEP believe the animal is an escaped mountain lion is because no such animals are known to exist in Connecticut, Rego said.

"It is so far from a source population is known to exist," he said. "That is the most logical explanation."

The DEP is analyzing DNA samples to determine whether the mountain lion is from a North American or South American source, Rego said. Often, those that are kept in captive hail from South America, he said.

Rego acknowledged that these animals can travel far, however, the closest areas where mountain lions are known to be are Florida, the Dakotas and some places in the far Midwest.

"If it's an animal from Florida that doesn't mean it's a dispersing animal," he said. "Some have gone 500 miles, but that still puts them 500 miles from Connecticut."

He added the mountain lion was no older than six years old.

Despite the fact that one animal has already been killed — and has been confirmed to likely be the same one previously sighted near Brunswick School in Greenwich — other mountain lion sightings continue to persist, even Monday morning.

Greenwich Police spokesman Lt. Kraig Gray said a sighting Sunday at a John Street residence in the backcountry section of northern Greenwich "was very credible. It was quite credible from five people from one family and they enjoyed enough time of viewing it to know what it was."

He added, "It was not the fleeting image" that officials have been seen in a photograph taken by a staff member of the Brunswick School. On June 5, staff at the private all-boys school on King Street, spotted a mountain lion on the campus, which abuts the Westchester County Airport.

The family reported watching the full-grown feline take two leaps to scale a 25-foot high retaining wall in the rear of their yard, according to Greenwich Emergency Management Director Dan Warzoha, a friend of the family who does not want to be identified.

The family's property abuts Audubon Greenwich property. Officials there closed its trails as a precaution Sunday. A message left Monday afternoon with Audubon officials was not immediately returned.

Gray said a motorist reported seeing "what they thought they saw it in a tree on the Merritt Parkway near the North Street exit." He said that sighting is considered unverified and that his department was notified by the state DEP of that incident. Further details were not immediately available.

Greenwich Police could not immediately provide information on a report a bobcat was struck and killed by a motor vehicle Friday night on King Street, in the area of the Convent of the Sacred Heart School campus.

As for other possible sightings, a mountain lion sighting was reported in Middlebury in early June and commenters on several Patch sites have reported their own sightings. The DEP has historically denied all of them, and Dennis Schain, department spokesman, reconfirmed Monday that these sightings usually turn out to be some other animal.

"Everything to a dog, to a coyote to a bobcat upon examination," Schain said.

On a lighter note, the Greenwich mountain lion continues its virtual life. Over the weekend, the GML's Facebook page has grown from less than 200 friends to more than 900 Monday afternoon.

Its latest post: Greenwich Mountain Lion wrote:

"Somebody call Barbara Walters for me, and let her know I'd like a spot on The View. It'd be perfect: I can growl at Elizabeth Hasselbeck and the other annoying women on the show when they say something annoying! Barbara going to commercial: "we'll be back, right after the GML finishes mauling Elizabeth...and maybe Sherry..."

http://newcanaan.patch.com/articles/dep-dead-mountain-lion-was-held-in-captivity

Big cat researchers take Santa Cruz sixth-graders to the mounts on research mission

By Nadia Drake - Santa Cruz Sentinel
Posted: 03/28/2011 07:39:49 PM PDT

SANTA CRUZ MOUNTAINS - While the skies unleashed torrents of water on Saturday morning, a group of enthusiastic sixth-graders squelched through mud, jumped into puddles and stopped to stare at poop in the hills above Santa Cruz.

They were on a field trip designed to teach them about the mountain lion, one of Santa Cruz County's most notorious and elusive inhabitants.

"I'm having fun," said Gabby White, 12. "We're learning about poo!"

Yes, among other facts, the group learned that carnivore poop contains fur and bones, but otherwise can look quite similar to doggy-doo. Often, poop and paw prints are the only signs anyone will ever see of the shy, nocturnal mountain lions.

"They live right next to us but keep themselves hidden," said UC Santa Cruz graduate student and biologist Yiwei Wang, one of the students' guides for the day.

Spotting scat along the trail became a source of shrieking amusement for the kids, who also listened closely to Wang and Yasaman Shakeri, both of whom work with UC Santa Cruz environmental scientist Chris Wilmers. Wilmers' group is tracking pumas in the Santa Cruz mountains using high-tech collars that allow scientists to learn not only about lion location, but lion activity.

"The collars let you see if the cat is doing stuff like flicking its tail or hunting prey or resting," said Craig Schroeder, public outreach manager for the Felidae Conservation Fund and organizer of Saturday's field trip.

Learning about the pumas' behavior will help scientists understand the role pumas play in the Santa Cruz Mountain ecosystem. As humans move into mountain lion habitat, encounters and sightings are becoming more frequent - and the mountains have become a habitat island, isolated by roads and water. Animal movement into and out of the mountains is limited.

"When you cut off a population, over time that contributes to extinctions," Schroeder said. "We're trying to mitigate that before it's too late."

The Felidae Conservation Fund, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving populations of big cats worldwide, includes field trips as part of their new educational outreach program. Using funds from the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, they designed a three-pronged lesson plan aimed toward teaching middle and high school students about pumas. The students learn through lectures, a predator-prey lab exercise, and a field trip led by researchers such as Wang and Shakeri.

"We'd like to get in front of every school we can," Schroeder said. "These kids can see amazing animals right here, and you can see their excitement when they're out in the field."

This group, from Branciforte Middle School, is the fourth class to follow classroom learning with field excursions.

"This is the way to tie together what they've seen in the classroom," said teacher Erin Petersen-Lindberg. "These opportunities are fantastic. The timing is perfect. We're just starting to learn about ecology now."

At the beginning of the field trip, Wang and Shakeri showed students how project biologists catch pumas using 6-foot long cages normally baited with deer legs. When the trap snaps shut, a radio transmitter on the cage emits a characteristic beeping sound that lets project scientists know an animal is inside.

"We sit about half a mile away and check to see if the transmitter is going off," Wang said. "We don't want to leave the cat in there."

Kids tested the cage trap by crawling in. Then they learned how scientists put radio-emitting collars on the cats that let them track animals and remotely download data.

Then they headed into the woods - swathed in ponchos and armed with umbrellas - while Wang and Shakeri spoke about how mountain lions move through natural habitats and stalk prey.

"A lot of times, mountain lions will just wait right off the trail for the opportunity to jump on a deer," said Wang.

That might sound alarming, but pumas rarely attack humans. Six people have been killed by mountain lions in California since 1890.

"You definitely want to treat the lions with respect because they're predators, but they're not something to be fearful of all the time," Wang said. "Hitting a deer in your car is a lot more dangerous."

Indeed, deer are the puma's preferred meal, and Wang and Shakeri led students to a grove of trees about 50 feet off the trail. There, they showed students an old deer-kill site - a months-old pile of bones in the brush beneath a tree - dragged there by a puma so it could dine undisturbed.

"Is that the head right there? I want to see the head!" said White, who appeared fascinated by the skeletal bits near her feet. She prodded the bones with a stick while asking non-stop questions of the researchers. Other kids took pictures.

Then it was time to head back, and students stopped along the way to learn how biologists set up motion-activated cameras to snap photos of pumas walking in the wild. They watched while Shakeri demonstrated how pumas mark territories by scraping leaves into piles with their back feet.

"I had fun, but my feet didn't. They're soaked," said Jessie Martines, 12, as she returned to the school bus. "But I would do this again. Just wear rain boots next time."

http://www.contracostatimes.com/california/ci_17720989?nclick_check=1

Mountain lions sighted on Scottsdale golf course

Courtesy of Linda Borman

A family of mountain lions came out after the rains
this week at Desert Mountain Golf Club's Cochise Course.

by Philip Haldiman - Mar. 25, 2011 02:33 PM
The Arizona Republic

A north Scottsdale couple feel lucky to have made a rare sighting of three mountain lions this week on the fourth hole of Desert Mountain Golf Club's Cochise Course.

Desert Mountain resident Linda Borman said she quickly snapped a few photographs on Monday afternoon after her husband, Ty, saw the mother and her two cubs lounging on the fairway of the 546-yard, par-5 hole.

Photos of the mountain lions in Scottsdale

"Ty has a habit of looking out the window in hopes of seeing something," Linda said. "They came out after the rain. I think because nobody was out on the golf course at that time."

Tom Cadden, public information officer for Arizona Game and Fish, said mountain lions live throughout the state, most commonly in rocky areas, where people don't usually see them.

According to the Arizona Game and Fish Department, Arizona's mountain lion population could be as high as 3,000. He said that part of the Valley is home to that species of cat.

"There are certainly some mountain lions in that habitat," Cadden said.

The Bormans have lived along the course - one of six private tracts surrounded by rugged Sonoran Desert - for six years. In that time, they said that they have seen all kinds of native wildlife: javelinas, bobcats, coyotes, diamondback rattlesnakes - but never mountain lions, until Monday.

Linda said the impressive cats hung around for about five minutes, seemingly undisturbed by her taking photos.

It was a "once-in-a-lifetime spectacle," she said.

Ty called it a " 'National Geographic' moment.'"

Linda said she took the first photos through a window because she didn't want to scare away the animals.

"Then I went outside to get a little closer; each time I clicked, they looked at me," she said. "The cubs seemed curious, but not afraid, and the mother looked very protective.

"My husband still hasn't come down from Cloud 9."

http://www.azcentral.com/community/scottsdale/articles/2011/03/25/20110325scottsdale-mountain-lions-desert-mountain-golf-course.html

Mountain lion sightings more common, but still rare

Duluth, Minn. — The mountain lion, one of North America's top predators is being sighted more often in Minnesota.


State Department of Natural Resources officials say mountain lions, also known as cougars and pumas, have turned up in increasing numbers in the past two years.

That wouldn't surprise Ron Brodigan, who has a vivid memory of his encounter a decade ago with what he is certain was a mountain lion - the fourth time he had seen one.

Brodigan would take late night jogs on the road past his place near Isabella, in the Superior National Forest. His running partner was Teddy, a big golden retriever.

"We headed out here to the driveway, and out to the road. She started acting kind of funny, and her hair was standing up on her back and on her neck," Brodigan said of his dog. "The two of us took off down the road, and we'd only gone a few yards, and she really reacted. And then all of the sudden there was a big 'yowl.' And, that was one of the scariest things in my life."

There, clearly visible in the glow of his driveway light, Brodigan said, was a mountain lion, right in the middle of the highway.

"It was just walking toward us, minding its own business, coming up the center line of the road," he said. "And a couple of seconds later we would have smacked right into it."


The DNR has confirmed six reports in 13 months as mountain lions. They're turning up on trail-cams, like photos a few weeks ago north of Two Harbors. One animal was hit and killed in traffic near Bemidji last year. Another caught on a Champlin squad car camera last winter was then tracked wandering through Wisconsin.

Mountain lions range from the Canadian Yukon territories south to the South American Andes. In the United States they occupy mostly western states, reaching east to the Black Hills, which the cats re-populated in the 1990s.

Sightings have become so common in Minnesota that the Minnesota Deer Hunters Association is collecting cougar stories on their website.

Mark Johnson, the association's executive director, said deer hunters are concerned about the cougar sightings because they're after the same prey as mountain lions.

"With the sightings and with reports of sightings, people are a little apprehensive when they go into the woods about any time there's a big predator that potentially could rival you, or hunt you," Johnson said.

The website has received a few reports the organization felt were strong enough to share with state wildlife officials. But that doesn't mean each one was a mountain lion, said John Erb, a biologist with the DNR's Forest/Wildlife Research Group in Grand Rapids.

"They've gotten a ton of stuff reported, but only one that has information that you can sort of try and verify, and that was this one that's being worked on," Erb said of one report. "It's actually a series of three pictures of the same cat."

DNR officials say no evidence exists to prove that cougars have become resident in Minnesota. Some people mistake deer, dogs or bobcats as mountain lions. Erb said some actual mountain lions found in the state had been in captivity.

"We've had at least, I think five mountain lions captured or killed running around that we are either certain or highly likely were captive animals," he said. "One of them was de-clawed. Someone shot it on their front porch. It was looking into their house."

Where mountain lions are clearly established, Erb said, you see the evidence such as their kills. In the Black Hills, half a dozen mountain lions are killed by cars every year.

"So far the evidence is pretty strong that the people who think we have hundreds of them out there probably need a little dose of reality," he said.

Erb said the cats might eventually settle in Minnesota. There's plenty of deer to eat. But little is known how cougars interact with wolves -- or how they'd do in northern Minnesota's deep snow. Even if established, they might remain very scarce.

But with some 400,000 deer hunters in the woods during the annual firearms deer hunt, the number of mountain lion sightings may be on the verge of a new spike.

http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2010/11/12/mountain-lions/