But no proof was offered. Now again I don't know that there's anything to that. And I was probably about a half a mile from downtown all village on the right. I was a Bobcat we saw it and I have a picture of it. Yes and you want to share what you learned. Which brings us to the next question, what are the odds that some of these reported sightings (which, when I posted about this on twitter, I immediately started to get as well) are actually people seeing a mountain lion? Despite numerous reports, the NH Fish and Game Department continues to have no physical evidence of mountain lion presence in the state. Sam Evans-Brown: Pretty well I was going to say it is nice to hear about how to identify the facial markings but probably I'd being a to identify the tracks is probably the more useful useful tool that one can have in their tool box. Caller: I have yeah. People go through great lengths to create hoaxes like this. The last catamount in Vermont is finally, officially, certainly dead. So what I'm getting back is the verifying and confirming of evidence what that was not there. He shifted gears in 2016 and began producing Outside/In, a podcast and radio show about the natural world and how we use it. His work has won him several awards, including two regional Edward R. Murrow awards, one national Murrow, and the Overseas Press Club of America's award for best environmental reporting in any medium. I've collected scat samples I've got several in my collection. So maybe a good pet for you but not for your neighbor if you just stop by unannounced. And really whenever you hear tiny code and long rope like tale it's kind of hard to pin this sighting on any other creature rather than an outline or just nothing else really matches that description. Okay. So do they. So before we get to the the the the stories of sightings we're getting a lot of calls. (Cue the X-Files music: The Government is denying the cougars exist!) This decision was primarily for nerdy phylogeny reasons, though, because the eastern cougar probably never existed. lewis structure for ch2cl. Peter Biello: Today on the program Patrick Tate New Hampshire Fish and Game Wildlife biologist and far better project leader Sam Evans Brown host of an HP podcast outside in which is about the natural world and how we use it. Women control our lives. A monthly donation of $5 makes a real difference. So Michael follows with the question. However, as far as I can tell theres no Deep State Conspiracy to cover up a breeding population of cougars in the Granite State. Peter Biello: Well John thanks very much for the story really appreciate it. So I've been convinced the whole time that I saw a big cougar plume or whatever you want to call it standing there in the road in Greenfield. And those and that's how you can go from a story that Pat says I have nothing to say about that to a story that you know could be the first verified sighting in over 100 years. State officials confirmed the presence of a mountain lion near the Quabbin Reservoir in the late 1990s. I had a resident in New Hampshire tell me a story of a mountain lion in the 1960s where a person who would come summer in New Hampshire and then live in a different part of the country in the winter had a trailer that was housing his mount line. So what those ranges. Rick your thoughts. Mark Elbroch doesnt think so. They kill big animals. Patrick Tate: Well I've never seen an Easter cougar so I can't say when I've handled these 10 cougars and whatnot. And when provoked no animal could stand before him elegantly put. The big cat has been extinct here since the mid-1800s. It was killed in Lee New Hampshire in 1853. I don't see the hoaxes anymore at that level. You've got you've got biologists right who are trying to make their make their way in the world make a career if you are the biologists who confirmed a sighting of mountain lions in the state that would be very good for you like you would be all over the news. Think you've seen a mountain lion. Caller: And the more I thought about it the color of it it was definitely not a bobcat. The western mountain lion lives in a more of a grassland open area now so to blend in with a very lighted situation here in the Northeast we are very shadowy dark situation because of the forest and our cats wear a darker brownish reddish color than what they were and they were also smaller than what the western mountain lion is. There was no sign of it. I hope she's listening and she had spoke to a lot of different people ended up having a couple of sightings of her alone without sort of by accident. Updated: 9:53 AM EST Dec 6, 2016. Rick van de Poll: Well education is the real important thrust of of what all of us do as biologists and Game Managers and to make sure that a things like what Sam was saying that in spite of what you believe the mountain lions will not eat your children they will not steal your pets from your backyard and they will not necessarily be seen by you unless you're extremely lucky. M from Tree Hill author series presenting Diane lay back. Patrick Tate: Yes. Sam Evans-Brown: Certainly that is a thing I've heard but again you have to think of the incentives involved here. for some excitement. We send out DNA samples to the U.S. Forest Service Rocky Mountain Research Station. Pelosi story here we go. I believe I saw one that's fine and I'm not looking for an immediate story. Rick van de Poll: Well the mountain lion of course has been sort of an enigma in the wildlife suite for years and years. We are the second most-forested state in the country, and those forests can be impenetrable snarls (part of why the Northeast is notoriously a difficult place to hunt deer), and while there are people in a lot of those woods, because the cats have been absent for a few generations now, most of those people dont know what a cougar scrape or latrine look and smell like. The last documented individuals in the entire Northeast were killed in New Brunswick , Canada, in 1932, and Maine in 1938. support for an HBO who comes from you our listener Sam from advanced in you a local New Hampshire nonprofit specializing in college student loans and student refinancing options. Absolutely there are a lot of folks out there who for some reason need to create something that raises a stir and gets the attention of the media etc.. County road and all of a sudden a big cat jumps out of the woods over a stone wall stood in the middle of the dirt road as I rode towards it. I'm Peter Biello in for Laura NOI. Well let me ask maybe Pat and Rick about this. Peter Biello: This is the exchange on an PR. Mountain lion DNA was recovered from a Petersham, Mass., close to the New Hampshire border, after a 2016 incident in which a horse was injured. They peaked in . What Really Caused Washington's Cougar Attack. However, dispersing western mountain lions have left evidence as close as Connecticut, Massachusetts and New York. That's what we're seeing is dispersing mountain lions from the West who are just making their way through. So I know it's another unconfirmed report but you string enough of these together. Peter Biello: Yeah well what do you think Pat is. So when we talk about the threshold of evidence required to say for sure you have seen a mountain lion it is rather high. Sam Evans-Brown: And second the evidence required is is you know pretty pretty tough to gather. Patrick Tate: So I'm not sure what subspecies of cat they're using to differentiate by those markings but once she was describing the White other face in the black. So it's six months of a large large predatory animal that moves great distances on the landscape that is not known if it went northeast west Salt and how many circles it did. You know perhaps poke around where you saw it and see if you can find a track. So they're scary. The report came in from a conservation officer. Pat what do you think the mystique of the mountain lion. Deer manages to free itself from the claws of a mountain lion in Alpine, California. They sent it already. Here she is talking about how to identify a mountain lion. Let's look for other evidence. There are corollaries in other states. Patrick Tate: In theory it's a passing ball of a court and it goes wherever the bottom Ball wants to go. Mountain lions when they show up they leave evidence. Let's talk to Mike in Webster. So for me as a person who's had the Bobcats right off my grits similar carries sticks to a bobcat The Long Tail obviously very different but those facial markings were overlapping for me. So I don't understand really how how this this idea came to be but it is the main reason why folks believe that fishing game is is covering up the fact that there are mountain lions in the state again with no evidence. You need you need either a really good photograph or you need you know fresh scat that can be sent to a lab out West that can they can be identified there. I've had a number of people call up and say I found a scout in the woods and I want it DNA identified. Now Bobcat is a completely different species. Less than a year later I found a scat on the swamp range and I was working at the time with a fellow at the Michigan wildlife habitat Federation. Every other Friday on Morning Edition NHPRs Sam Evans-Brown tracks down answers to questions about the environment and outdoors for our listeners in a segment we call Ask Sam.. Early in the morning. Join as a sustainer and support independent local news for your community. Peter Biello: We got an e-mail question from Robert in Epsom who asks are sightings or encounters with these big cats less dangerous here where they're passing through than out west where those same mountain lines might be establishing territory Rick. Almost all species disperse greater distances than females. You know you have to have a license and it's hard to get that license a license to own a mountain lion. Part II. And so so with their limited staff and limited budget that is that is more and more limited every year because you know fewer people are buying hunting and fishing licenses. If youve got photo trap evidence of a Mountain Lion, send it in, and we'll send it along to the appropriate state or federal agency! So I will just say this is a big reason why there have not been confirmed sightings I think is that the evidence required first. Sam Evans-Brown has been working for New Hampshire Public Radio since 2010, when he began as a freelancer. And there's there's no evidence of that cat's movement in that entire you know 12 hundred miles stretch of its journey. The views expressed in this program are those of the individuals and not those of an HP are its board of trustees or its underwriters. Patrick Tate: Well. So one thing I'll add. Peter Biello: So let's say Rick that it was confirmed that there that there are mountain lines here in New Hampshire. Which goes back to the Connecticut Connecticut cat and what not. Anyways after three weeks I finally found the image on line on a field and stream photo contest and the explanation in the end was the person that set the camera out with another individual and they believed that someone who knew of the camera location saw the similarities put the can't picture on their SD card so it looked like that camera recorded the image that is. It's not a skinny rope like tail like a housecat. I really really enjoyed listening to this program so thank you all very much. Patrick Tate: Nice talk to you too. Mountain lion or cat running across. Had great trees behind it beautiful ferns on the ground so it brought me down on the site and the ferns on the ground matched. So I would put this in the category of sort of like shark attacks right. Some argue that it's a leap of faith. Patrick Tate: It's wow interesting that you brought this up because I've had people report I saw cardamom. But but I've also seen it cited the opposite way that look they're very secretive. So and so the idea that they can follow up on every individual sighting is just crazy right. Theres a project called the Cougar Network that tracks verified sightings, and they are all around us: Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, New York and New Brunswick have all had verified sightings over the past 20 years or so. By, March 2023 Fund Drive Rules and Regulations, Persons with disabilities who need assistance accessing NHPR's FCC public files, please contact us at publicfile@nhpr.org. State officials have said, over and over in recent years, that the eastern mountain lion has been completely wiped out from the Northeast. Still, it's been over 100 years since the last mountain lion was killed east of the Mississippi, except for a patch of them down in Florida, where there are supposed to be 100 to 200 still living. It doesn't happen as much anymore. Thanks for taking my call. So give us a call now. But if you were to get Western dispersing mountain lions just would just sort of expanding into New Hampshire. Peter Biello: From New Hampshire Public Radio I'm Peter Biello in for Lark Knoy and this is the exchange. These young males are tracking looking for mates and if they don't find a mate they just keep moving and moving and moving. Do they travel. It's unfortunate that that kind of thing happens as often as it does. And here we're talking about in this situation we're talking about it migrated from the West. It's completely possible that it may have spent time in New Hampshire and went undetected but had it stayed in the area ultimately it would have been detected over time. For me as a person who's handled many bobcats and looked at many pictures Bobcat the White chin Bobcat right off is what comes out to me and then the black the the roughs on our Bobcats we'll have sometimes have black fringes on them. Kyle I think about Rick Tate wants to jump in here. 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