She lives near the end of a gravel road in a modest, low-slung house tucked into the flanks of the Green Mountains. However, the captive lion theory was also wrong. There is a big difference between Tuesday when none of us saw a moose in our region and then Thursday we did, Morse says. Yes I have seen several pictures on game cameras from people in Massachusetts in Central and western Mass that do have mountain lions on their game camera so please dont be ignorant. Its closest living relative is the cheetah. How to Report a Possible Mountain Lion Sighting. The 1881 death of this catamount officially marked the end of cougars in Vermont; however, the very last Eastern cougar is thought to be an animal that was killed in Somerset County, Maine, in 1938. Then in June 2011, there were reports of a mountain lion in Greenwich and, for the first time, a photo. I knew it was a cat track because the tracks were in a straight line and no signs of claws like you would see with a coyote track. There are an estimated 3,000 - 7,000 Mountain lions in Colorado. And theres another school of thought, Well, no, there just are too many of them probably we have to reduce that population somehow. Where do you fall in that whole continuum? In their estimation, the presence of a breeding cougar population in New England would likely stem from our proximity to Canada, where, as they rightly point out, DNA analysis has resulted in 19 positive identifications across Quebec and New Brunswick since 2001 (although some of these were shown to be of South American lineage, suggesting escaped pets). I wasnt the only one to see the big cat. Learn More Who We Are & What We Do. Today, nearly 60% of Connecticut is covered in forest, and bobcats are regularly observed throughout the state. I now live in Boulder, CO where we have regular sightings.same animal as 35 yrs agohands down, Warren ,Ma early morning having my coffee on my front steps and noticed about 50 feet across the Road something coming out of the trail as it did it looked out at the road and turned around as it did I could see that it was a mountain lion ! Height at shoulder: 25-30 in. Abbott, of the Housatonic Valley Association, is equally skeptical of the vast majority of mountain lion sightings. Hawley said the last confirmed mountain lion sighting in the state was one that was killed on the Merritt Parkway in 2011 when a car struck the animal near Exit 55. The recent social media posting of what was thought to be an image of a mountain lion in Prairie du Rocher brought skepticism . When a group of officers arrived at a neighborhood in Loveland, Colorado . 8 January. That maybe, just maybe, what my wife and others saw wasnt a bobcat that seemed bigger in the thrill of the moment, but a real, honest-to-goodness mountain lion, a long-lost ghost of the forest. The last catamount in Vermont is finally, officially, certainly dead. Advocates of the proposed Aid in Dying bill made an emotional plea to state legislators in Hartford on Wednesday to approve the legislation, introduced 15 separate times in Connecticut since 1994. I heard from Neighbors that they have been sighting from the mass pike which runs along this area but also very close to Quabbin! They are most definitely here. He knew it was only a matter of time. Below are some of the first-hand. I only saw the back side, but he was huge. Dismissing most of the sightings as probable bobcats, Morse asserted that the scientific evidence has not been proven. Im not surprised that various state officers deny the presence of cougars in new England. The arrival of a real mountain lion in the state reframed the discussion in Connecticut surrounding the animal. So its this gathering storm. Instead, the responsne I heard were nonchalant, Oh, yes, lots of people have seen that mountain lion around here; pretty isnt it?. The young typically remain with their mother for 2 years. Watch Live at 7:00 PM: The U.S. and the Holocaust, a film by Ken Burns | Screening & Panel Discussion . And it was this curiosity that led me to the Old Well Tavern in Simsbury, Connecticut, at a time of day (11:30 a.m.) that does not normally find me ensconced in the dim confines of a drinking establishment. I thought I saw signs posted in Pawling NY about 8 years ago, that DEC released a pair to control deer population,mane several people have seen them in Wingdale, NY. They also have facial ruffs and ear tufts on the tips of their ears, as well as shorter tails. Theyll say, Hey, you can see in the picture that it has a long tail, and when I look at the picture, I say, I see how you would see that because they way these cats walk, theyll kind of stand and trail their rear leg. MLF. About This Home This charming 2 bed, 2 bath home, sits on a large lot facing north/south. Newspaperman John Harrigan has long covered the New England outdoors, including writing the New Hampshire Sunday News column Woods, Water & Wildlife which ran for almost 40 years. Wright, however, didnt agree with his mentor and began writing publicly about mountain lions in the East. About Us; It can run at speeds of up to 50 mph. In the 1930s, Bruce Wright, an influential wildlife manager from New Brunswick, Canada, began gathering reports of sightings of mountain lions in the East and searching for their tracks. Ive been doing this for 40 years. And consider, for a moment, the concern and outright fear an official acknowledgment of such a carnivorous and predatory creature might evoke. Connecticut Dept. When you look at a state like Connecticut, with all the people we have here, all the trail cameras we have in the woods, all the cars we have driving you can imagine if we had an established population here in Connecticut, we would know about it pretty quickly. Its definitely a problem thats only going to get worse. And so when they come to him with a sighting, hes prepared to believe. I was deer hunting with my father, it was in the fall about 7 years ago, in Barre Ma towards the Templeton Ma lines. Mountain lions, also known as cougars or pumas, are a big cat species native to the Americas. The official word is that mountain lions were declared extinct in Connecticut back in the late 1800s but sightings have become much more prevalent. Mountain lions (commonly called cougar or puma) vary in size and weight. But the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection said Sunday that bobcats are the only large wild cats found in the state. Emaileditor@connecticutmag.com, or contact usonFacebook@connecticutmagazine orTwitter@connecticutmag. McEnroe: Scientifically, this is a case where absence of evidence is kind of evidence of absence, right? Perhaps, then, the ultimate question isnt whether cougars are among us, but rather how we can encourage them to settle here. By 1825, only 25% of Connecticut was forested due to deforestation from agricultural activities and other uses of timber. I was aware, too, of how a certain mythology surrounding the animal had taken root in Vermonts culture and even its identity: The University of Vermonts athletic teams, for instance, are known as the Vermont Catamounts, and their logo features a snarling cat lunging through the cleft of a V., I met with Morse at her home in Jericho. Were getting more and more home entries every year. Mountain lion spotted in East Haddam - YouTube 0:00 / 2:17 Mountain lion spotted in East Haddam 6,872 views Apr 27, 2012 22 Dislike Share Save WTNH News8 135K subscribers A Mountain lion. Bios and videos of the New Haven Register's 90th First-Team All-State Football players. Saw one on old mountain rd Peterborough N.H. a few years ago on my property followed it and ran to get my camera have a photo but in distance by time got it was amazing animal t Metcalf. And yet there I was, on a Saturday in early November, crammed into a booth with Bo Ottmann, 48, and Bill Betty, 72, of Cougars of the Valley, the organization that Ottmann founded in 2007 to gather evidence of and alert the public to the big cats living among us. He wore red suspenders and a baseball cap. It has a long, black-tipped tail and black . Can they really all be cases of false identification? Working in the 1980s in southern California, where there are cougars, biologist Paul Beier said that 95 percent of cougar sightings they investigated turned out to be misidentifications. Weight. As a carnivore biologist, Hawley says he would love it if mountain lions were here. The big cat on the ground before him, motionless, yet somehow still embodying that particular feline litheness, as if, with the flick of its tail, it might bound to its feet and disappear into the woods. You could have 50. They can be found in several different ecosystems including mountains, forests, wetlands, and deserts. To report grouse sightings, please contact Wildlife Division biologist Will Cassidy at william.cassidy@ct.gov or 860-418-5961. Im not an expert on human psychology, but if youre looking for something, you have a greater chance of actually seeing it. He and his clients were 100% sure of what they saw, and its very difficult to imagine any other animal being mistaken for a cougar in this case. The expert opinion held up until a man was killed by a Great White not too far away. Its not a bear, not a dog, not a deer, not a bobcat. Its distinctive featurethe one that sets it apart from other North American wild catsis its tail, which is thick and often as long as its body. For helpful information on identifying mountain lion tracks and more, visit the Missouri Department of . Theres probably 100 in Connecticut, Ottmann interrupted, rolling a cigarette as he spoke. The range of a Mountain Lion may cover 25 to 785 square miles. The tail, I said. In the 37 years Ive been working, things have changed in ways Id never have predicted. When we reached tower, a ranger arrived in a pickup. A threat to livestock, they were hunted out of the state and driven to parts more wild. What we do not have is a secure predator corridor.. Massachusetts and several other New England states have bear hunting, or harvest, seasons, which proponents say help control populations. In some versions, state officials dont want to alarm people about the feline predators in their midst. (Throughout history, people have had a deep fear of these creatures, hounding and hunting them mercilessly.) vital part of this countries ecosystem. She served as the Senior Producer for 'The Colin McEnroe Show' for several years before stepping down in 2021 and returning to her previous career as a registered nurse. It is also known as cougar, panther, mountain lion, and puma, though catamount is the preferred regional vernacular. People clearly arent lying when they say they saw a cougar; [the sighting] has a profound effect on them.. By Cameron Arcand October 3, 2021 at 2:07pm. In 1994, scat collected after a sighting in Craftsbury, Vermont, was found to contain cougar hair (the animals are prone to ingesting their hair while grooming), and the commissioner of the Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department circulated a memo with the following line: It is possible that cougars of unknown origin may be breeding to a limited extent in Vermont. Its not my call. Experts need to see the body to dismiss their prejudices. Lizzie Post Would Like Your Attention. Given the long, shared border between these provinces and New England, along with plentiful evidence that other species cross this border regularly, it seems entirely possible that cougars would also engage in international travel. I mentioned this to a neighbor who spotted one a few miles away. According to the Smithsonians National Zoo, bobcats are part of the lynx genus, which means they are related to other cats like the Canadian lynx, Iberian lynx and Eurasian lynx. 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