Cougars

[Homicidalheathen]

Yup right here where I live.......I saw a clip on TV yesturday and it does indeed look like a cougar is in my city.

http://www.savethecougar.org/

[Steven]

I thought YOU were the cougar......

[Msterbeau]

I thought YOU were the cougar......

Bwahahahaha!

[Fierce Critter]

I read an article recently. There are probably also one or more skulking around Monroe county.

Jon and a friend of his like to go fishing in Lake Erie offshore where there used to be a sort of campground in the early part of the century. Jon got a call a few weeks ago from the friend, and he was asking what might make really big catlike footprints in the mud. Like, REALLY big.

He hightailed it out of there and they're not planning on going there again anytime soon. This is a kinda desolate area, and it's in Monroe county.

Personally, I love the idea of big cats in Michigan. But more than likely, they're released pets or something like that, and overall, it's not safe for them. They'll probably end up shot.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

There is no man behind the curtain.

There are no cougars in the lower peninsula of Michigan.

[Fierce Critter]

There is no man behind the curtain.

There are no cougars in the lower peninsula of Michigan.

Mark, there are proven sightings. There are tracks and scat as evidence.

Again, they're probably released pets. I don't remember what magazine I read all this in, I believe it was either a nature magazine or a local glossy Detroit-based rag.

But again - they are more than likely released pets. The chances of them getting together and mating and creating progeny are most likely nil. They're too widely scattered, for one thing. Once they're caught or die, there won't be anymore, until and unless someone releases another "exotic" pet.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

I think you misunderstood me.

I believe there ARE wild cougars in Michigan. I think that the population of cougars is way higher than the DNR is willing to admit.

The fact that the DNR had a gag order on all it's agents for years says volumes. Then proof started showing up of cougars all over the state. Pictures of them in the wild and castings of prints... A few years ago the DNR changed thier statement from "There are NO..." to "If they are here, they are escaped pets or transiants from 900 miles away"

Bullshit.

I'm really good friends with an older DNR agent.

Michigan has a small natural population of cougar. One that the DNR protects by pretending they are not there.

[TomCat]

I thought YOU were the cougar......

LOL, I thought you guys were talking about Brenda for a second...

[Shade Everdark]

It has been my understanding, from a couple of different sources around the internet, that the overall cougar population of North America is on the rise again, and whereas they used to be relegated to parts of the western US, they've been making their way back east again.

I'd be fully willing to believe Gaf on this one; it's really too early to make any predictions about the cougar population as a whole, and they likely don't want to send everyone into a panic by announcing that cougars have found their way back to the eastern states. Knowing people, there would probably be some sort of frenzied effort to hunt them all down.

Which is dumb. Cougars don't even go after livestock terribly much, according to my understanding, unless they are having trouble finding more traditional food.

[odims_sphere]

I just looked at the link:

Washtenaw County- Cougar Sighting.

Reported Sun 3/16/2008 8:23 AM to www.savethecougar.org

Date of Observation: 03/12/2008

Time: 9:45 p.m.

County: Washtenaw

Location Description: Ann Arbor Road, about 1/2 mile east of Gotfredson Road, in Plymouth Township

Sighting Description:

"I had just turned eastbound onto Ann Arbor Road off of Gotfredson Road and about 1/2 mile down the road (before Lucas Nursery), a large animal cross the road close enough that my headlights just caught it. It stopped briefly and looked into my lights so I could get a fairly good look. It appeared to be around 3 feet tall with a shorter face (not canine-like, in other words), long tail, and what appeared to be very short hair tan in color. I feel that the only animal this could have been was a cougar."

That's about a mile from my parents house.

I tell you what, if I see it while my kids are out and about it'll be one less cougar in Michigan. Endangered or not.

[phee]

A Cougar in Michigan! Run!

[Rayne]

There's a lot of those by my house.

We see a lot of deer and coyotes.

Now cougars, huh?

[Fierce Critter]

Mark - that's all what I have inwardly believed - and hoped.

It's one big giant "Duh - no kidding!" that I love cougars. I personally would love to see them throughout Michigan.

But I still fear for any that come so close to (sub)urban areas. I'm afraid most people would feel like Odim's, and not like them being 'round.

For their own sake, I hope they flourish - but stick to the woodlands further north.

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

I had one in my yard a few weeks ago when i came home from work. I was within 50 feet of it... and thats as close as I ever want to get to a cougar in the wild again.

It was a very cool... in a "oh my god don't see me as food!" kinda way.

Second large animal that could kill me without a thought I have looked into the eye of. (I locked eyes with a Grey Wolf across a 15foot wide stream. We both walked down to the water and were drinking before we noticed each other. We looked each other in the eye for about 20 seconds.. then I bent down and laid my head near the ground, which in canine gave him dominance. He went back to drinking and I backed away. Very cool moment)

[Gaf The Horse With Tears]

BTW... The area where I used to live.. that I tried to convinve you that you and John would have fit into... everyone knows there are cougars there... because they are seen almost weekly. There is even a swamp just outside Lake City that is the only placve the DNR admits might just have cougars in it... in numbers. It's buried on thier website.. but they do admit in one document that cougars live in that swamp.

[Fierce Critter]

Jon and I like to joke about how much he loves otters, and I love cougars. And how we like to imagine meeting up with wild ones, and him swimming and playing with otters, and me petting cougars and wrestling with them, etc.

And then we look each other in the eye and say how it would REALLY go. He'd probably end up with some damned nasty bites and scratches, and perhaps lose a finger. And how I'd basically be a big, pink, can of shredded Purina Cougar Chow.

I love 'em, and I'd love to see them - from a safe, non-downwind distance. If I ever ran into one unexpectedly, I'd be wondering how it's gonna feel to die at the claws & teeth of such a beautiful animal.

[Fierce Critter]

BTW... The area where I used to live.. that I tried to convinve you that you and John would have fit into... everyone knows there are cougars there... because they are seen almost weekly. There is even a swamp just outside Lake City that is the only placve the DNR admits might just have cougars in it... in numbers. It's buried on thier website.. but they do admit in one document that cougars live in that swamp.

I think Jon and I would love to summer in that area. Everything you've described sounds glorious.

But we learned the hard way in NC - we do not do well too far from some kind of suburban center. And downtown Cadillac was just o.k. We prefer Grand Traverse.

I think we're going to end up on the Leelanau peninsula someday. Perhaps in Cedar.

[ttogreh]

I know this is gonna sound weird, but if I were to ever get killed by a cougar, I'd hope it could get away. At the same time, if I ever see a cougar stalking a child in my back yard, BLAM.

Does that make sense, at all? Being ok with getting killed, but willing to kill to protect someone else?

[Fierce Critter]

I know this is gonna sound weird, but if I were to ever get killed by a cougar, I'd hope it could get away. At the same time, if I ever see a cougar stalking a child in my back yard, BLAM.

Does that make sense, at all? Being ok with getting killed, but willing to kill to protect someone else?

If a cougar is after someone I love - I will do what I can to kill that cougar.

If a cougar is after me, I will do whatever I can to NOT be killed by it. I doubt I could do anything without a firearm of some kind. But I will do whatever my wits & environment allow.

[odims_sphere]

But I still fear for any that come so close to (sub)urban areas. I'm afraid most people would feel like Odim's, and not like them being 'round.

I don't care if they're around, just not while and where my kids are. Other than that I couldn't care less about them.

[Destroit]

I love 'em, and I'd love to see them - from a safe, non-downwind distance. If I ever ran into one unexpectedly, I'd be wondering how it's gonna feel to die at the claws & teeth of such a beautiful animal.

Oh I've been there, it's a "awww lookit how cute...OMFG IT'S COMING THIS WAY!" kind of a thing. I was camping up north and went to go find the bathroom myself. I didn't have my glasses on and got lost (I was a little dumb when I was 12) and low and behold in the middle of the woods was a cougar and her BABY. Yeap...that's when you don't want to run into animals is when they've got a baby.

I almost didn't make it to the bathroom and peed right there . I basically walked slowly trying not to make eye contact or pay any attention to teh kitteh, because I didn't know what else to do and wasn't sure if the play dead thing worked only on bears. She came closer at first...which obviously made me nervous, but I guess when she figured out that not only was I bigger than her but simply passing through, she left me alone.

That's not even as bad as when we all ran away from a cougar when we were kids in the middle of the night and left my cousin peeing behind a truck to deal with it herself, pants around her ankles. If she were alive right now she'd probably still be pissed about it .

[ttogreh]

Uh, just to be clear, your cousin died of non-cougar related issues, right?

[jadnifer]

It kinda freaks me out a little bit I guess to know that there are cats around the area that I live that are big enough to kill me.

I remember, I think it was about a year or so ago on 23 mile rd, it looked like there was a HUGE cat sitting on the guard rail. Now I could have just been tired, but I know that I saw it and it kinda scared the crap out of me. It was around the time that everyone was talking about the liger.

As much as I love animals though, if it threatened my life or the life of someone that I care about, that will be one dead cougar.