So they're scary. Its impossible to say, but I think the odds are pretty good that some of these sightings are legit. What's interesting about Bobcats is here in the Northeast we have some very large bobcats. However, dispersing western mountain lions have left evidence as close as Connecticut, Massachusetts and New York. It doesn't happen as much anymore. The species that once inhabited the Northeast, known as the eastern mountain lion, is now extinct. There's always been physical evidence to prove those situations like hair or fur scat hair prints pictures of the animal print scat hair. Lots of people have stories about them, people have them on their game cameras I mean its kind of a thing. We'll hear from her periodically through the show. Credit: Elizabeth Nichols via Storyful . If you have them email exchange at an HP board or give us a call to tell us your story. Right. May 18, 2012 Mountain Lion Killed In Conn. You know perhaps poke around where you saw it and see if you can find a track. So I would put this in the category of sort of like shark attacks right. Jun 13, 2011. Rick shaking his head so Rick now correct me please. The last catamount in Vermont is finally, officially, certainly dead. The last wild mountain lion in New Hampshire may have been killed in the White Mountains in 1885. He played a pivotal role and he battled for recognition. Were there any differences between these two that we could have noticed right off. But I do think that it's appropriate that a fishing game agency would recognize verifiable proof if they could. Give us a call if you have a question or comments or story about perhaps seeing a mountain lion here in New Hampshire. Thanks for taking my call. I believe I saw one that's fine and I'm not looking for an immediate story. We we hear that there is allegedly a government conspiracy to deny the existence of mountain lions here in New Hampshire so I guess a local government conspiracy. Sort of dropped onto the SD card of a camera he'd set up out in the wild. Peter Biello: Mm hmm. The cougar is also commonly known as mountain lion, puma, mountain cat, catamount, or panther. Sam Evans-Brown: One in fact Helena silver in that sort of tome that Rick van de Poll read from at the beginning is she. Caller: Oh hi. New Hampshire Public Radio | There was a lot of DNA evidence. Mountain lions when they show up they leave evidence. NHPR is nonprofit and independent. You treat it as if it's a sincere situation. I've collected scat samples I've got several in my collection. A trail of DNA evidence collected over the years shows this particular mountain lion had traveled through New York, Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota. Caller: I do. The last known mountain lion killed in New Hampshire is displayed at the Woodman Museum in Dover. And I think a lot of folks would like them to be around. OK. There was no sign of it. So the U.S. Forest Service Rocky Mountain Research Station has a database on mountain lion and they can identify. It's not a skinny rope like tail like a housecat. Reviewing the evidence, the U.S. Incredible sighting and I called him the fish and game and they immediately sent me to a website to look at all the bobcat pictures. Well let me ask maybe Pat and Rick about this. DNA from scat or from fur, a clear track that is confirmed by an expert, or a photo that clearly shows a mountain lion. We did a short segment about mountain lion sightings earlier this year and and after which I was sent a photo and also a video recording that was mostly just audio because it was so dark the photo just a quick reverse Google image search you can put images online and see where else where else they've been posted revealed that the photo had been taking out taken out in Wyoming and has been used you know hundreds of times to claim and the person who sent it to me said it had been taken New Hampshire. It doesn't make much sense because you know mountain lions are as we as we said before. So nowadays we think of this in the Northeast as crazy stuff that people have a mountain lion as a pet. She quotes a biologist in Lyme New Hampshire who who is keeping two mountain lions himself so in the not too distant past in the early nineteen hundreds it was perhaps more common and still in Maine. Yes. He says when youve got a mountain lion in town, its kinda obvious. The exchange is a production of New Hampshire Public Radio. And those are not the same things. Here it is. Patrick Tate: In theory it's a passing ball of a court and it goes wherever the bottom Ball wants to go. So you want identifiable backgrounds. 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. The way that we define species has undergone a revolution with the advent of DNA testing. As I tried to get a picture of it so there was it was definitely we looked up all the pictures and it was definitely not a bobcat or anything else being it looked just like a mountain lion. Mountain lion or cat running across. Want to put this to to Patrick Tate who may have heard some some info or info from listeners like you about these these these cats. I'm gonna send you a letter that we researched this report and we spoke with those labs and the lab wrote in their letter to us that they could only say that Scott contained white Tea Party fur and that they could not say what deposited the scout because it's far too degraded listeners we'd love to hear from you about your mountain lion sightings if you have seen one or if you if you think you have give us a call we'd love to hear your story 1 800 8 9 2 6 4 7 7. Osga's group of volunteers sent hair samples. MicroBios. No that's a little bit outside the range. So I hate the idea that there's some sort of upward you know downward pressure from the bosses saying Don't you know don't tell about the mountain lions because it'll scare away the tourists. In recent years, number of reported cougar sightings has never dropped below double digits, according to data from New Hampshire's Fish & Game Department from 2010 to present day. Thanks also to Rick van de Poll naturalist and founder of ecosystem management consultants of New England and Sam Evans Brown host of an HP podcast outside in about the natural world and how we use it. And so. (Credit: Buddy Wilkerson via Storyful) . And I saw you cat about four feet long from nose to tail come across from the water across the road and just leap over a six foot perimeter fence in a single bound. We had six copies printed out each. Thanks for calling. Which which I think Pat and I have both experienced. So if you were to ask me has a mountain lion ever passed through New Hampshire and been spotted by somebody who wasnt able to get hard evidence? Id personally be willing to say "probably, yes.". Thank you very much for listening. And maybe it's a no holds barred nostalgia for a better world a wild or Fuller world not a world that's constrained by our boundaries and our taxes and our highways. Peter Biello: Thank you for sharing that. Peter Biello: Yeah some of what she was saying sounds like it would require getting pretty close or at least having a nice zoom lens right Sam like. This is a machine-generated transcript, and may contain errors. Mountain Lions are a mythical creature in New Hampshire with strong feelings on both sides of the question: are there Mountain Lions in New Hampshire? 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. It was in the spring flash kind of early summer and my wife looked at you look at the size of an adult bear and we were up in arms. Peter Biello: Listeners give us a call if you have a question or a story of a sighting 1 800 8 9 2 6 4 7 7. As far as I could tell there was a positive DNA sequence coming from the scat sample Patrick. Artculos cientficos; Artculos de divulgacin; Menu John thanks. We rely on readers like you to support the local, national, and international coverage on this website. Peter Biello: Mm hmm. Is that typically what was happening there. There's just one subspecies of North American mountain lion. I looked at the picture and asked me what do you see in the picture and I wrote back. We actually have the largest subspecies of bobcat in the northern part of our state which they can get up to 40 and over 40 pounds which looks like an 80 pound the animal to visually and quite large. From came from out west they tracked it all the way back to the Black Hills in the Dakotas. When they were landing or taking off and it seems like it's been there for like. He studied Politics and Spanish at Bates College, and before reporting was variously employed as a Spanish teacher, farmer, bicycle mechanic, ski coach, research assistant, a wilderness trip leader and a technical supporter. But you can continue the conversation on Facebook or at our Web site and HP Borg. Does not test random Scouts. That's the real story is they can't follow up on every one of these sightings. So that's the specimen that you find going long distances. We discuss what residents may have been seeing and what breeding mountain lion pairs would mean for our ecosystem. We rely on readers like you to support the local, national, and international coverage on this website. Listeners give us a call if you'd like. Caller: I got home to my wife that a gene that you should have seen the cat. And you know all that. Patrick Tate: If I could just say one thing. You know I think it's there's a lady Holly Ernst out in California who has done a lot of the genotyping of mountain lions in Northern California the ones that are of course most people have heard about taking down hikers bikers etc. 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. So this whole illegal pet trade black market pro trade thing does does exist in a situation like that can happen. So one thing I'd point out is we've been talking about situations with no evidence a number of them come in with photographs and yet what they fit what they description of the animal they saw and by the way I got a picture of what I saw. There's never, ever, ever, ever been a documented case of a black mountain lion. So. Novartis sold $1.1 billion worth of Gilenya in the U.S. last year, a 19% drop from 2021 that was caused in part by generic competition, according to . Patrick Tate: My line being a large predator a cat watch ambush his prey animal that hasn't been. And so a mountain lion is actually quite large right. And what was really remarkable about the whole thing was I was maybe a half mile down on all buildings. But if you do if you think you're looking at a wild Puma their tail is very thick and especially in the winter is very thick and ponderous looking. Caller: Absolutely. The tail leave is a giveaway but not everybody gets to see the tail. Caller: Oh yeah. Caller: Hey guys how you doing. And so I just wanted to share my share my experience with you guys and it was pretty awesome to see if you get to see one albeit it was in the brush. There's no logic for why they'd be listed as an endangered species. I mean there was this one lady I remember and tough tomorrow. Peter Biello: I did mention four feet nose to tail would be kind of small for a mountain lion. And listeners this has been a lively conversation we're sorry we didn't get to all the the e-mailed comments and the phone calls your stories are appreciated even if we didn't get a chance to hear them today. Mike Guyton pressure was almost Greyhound like very muscular large back legs on it and the coloration on it was almost an orange brownish orange color and so I stop and I look at this thing in the field and as the animal looks at me the face was very chiseled definitely not a bobcat. Rick van de Poll: Well a report that you know as John Harrigan up north has in co-ops County for about 15 years I kept track of reports and people would call me and tell me where they saw the mountain lion they thought they saw it and it varied right from you know downtown villages all the way to remote highlands of the North Country and and everywhere in between. 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. Pat do they typically just move around a lot. Peter Biello: Let's go to Mike in Epping. 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. Caller: And the more I thought about it the color of it it was definitely not a bobcat. The number 1 800 8 9 2 6 4 7 7 so promised a discussion about conspiracy theories. It was killed in Lee New Hampshire in 1853. If it's just in the middle of a greenfield you can't prove anything. So I certainly can't dispute anything that they said there's no evidence for me to go by to verify or say what my thoughts are on the situation. Do we have native species that could have exhibited this type of behavior leaving leaving a deer carcass up in a tree. Sam Evans-Brown: What he would have stopped as well I think is way way that the reason that mountain lion kept moving is because he wasn't finding anybody. Sam Evans-Brown: So I just had two thoughts which is that we hear a lot of these stories and all of us here have heard these stories. The states never denied mountain lions are here, and theyve never admitted mountain lions are here. The second story window through about 30 feet away from it. I've actually had to walk in on one or two now and look at what was going on and figured out what was going on. Rick van de Poll: Rick your thoughts. And just one more note about this danger question when even when you look at the states that have extended populations stable populations of mountain lions attacks are relatively rare. It's you know I recognized their report and. As wildlife biologists, wed be fascinated to say 'look look what was found in our state.'. Peter Biello: Let's talk to Ron and where Ron thanks very much for calling. Any sense of of whether or not mountain lions are sort of wary of more population dense areas like like the one he was describing Rick. Patrick Tate: Okay. So let's let's go to the phones. Peter Biello: Wow. 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. Patrick Tate: It became a very interesting investigation over time because it started becoming. I was a Bobcat we saw it and I have a picture of it. And it was you know 10 or 12 people saw it all at once. Peter Biello: Yeah. Since then, there have been a handful of confirmed mountain lion sightings in the Northeast, although most have been thought to be escaped captive animals. It was some sort of a Lion Mountain Lion animal. Me Im willing to believe its possible that there are some out there. So hey, just me shooting from the hip, maybe there are a couple mountain lions skulking about. Join as a sustainer and support independent local news for your community. We'll hear more about the mountain lions impact and the role it plays in the ecosystem. The Idaho Department of Fish and Game last week killed a mountain lion that entered a Hailey family's chicken coop, marking the third time the agency has killed a mountain lion in the Wood River . They create these big latrines that are very obvious. Fish and Game looked into the labs to have them confirm the information in the reports which the labs did not. I came to a stop and it was and I've seen a lot of bobcats in my time and I just came to a stop it was just sort of confused about what I was seeing. And as the biologist who's gonna stand on this and if I'm going to say this is a proven picture I need to be able to stand on it so soundly and have the evidence so I going to go through it with a fine tooth comb kept picking pieces apart trying to answer these pieces. 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. Have a photo. BUT THAT SAID, Id love to be proven wrong. And today we're talking about the mysterious elusive mountain line with folks who know something about it. Patrick Tate: Well I've never seen an Easter cougar so I can't say when I've handled these 10 cougars and whatnot. Let us know your story and share your photos. I noticed it had a really big sweeping tail that kind of curled up behind it and all but still at that point because everyone says there's no mountain lions here. A monthly donation of $5 makes a real difference. And here we're talking about in this situation we're talking about it migrated from the West. We mentioned that one cat that was hit by a car where it has it that it was a male looking for me. 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