2 more mountain lion stories......

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Last Friday, I met and hiked with some veterans of the Catskills(some of them completed their 35x12 list). They came across Mountain Lion tracks in the Blackhead range.And they know the difference between that and a Bobcat or Coyote.A horse was killed in the valley below that week. Unfortunately no camera.I have never seen one,but I do pack a camera just in case. No Moose exists in the Catskills either,but people see them and one was hit by a truck on the T-way.
 
Good, maybe they can feast on the overpopulation of deer in the area. -Mattl
 
Hey Ralph, was that horse kill very rescent? I hadn't heard about it. Also on moose travels, there was one a few years back that came down through Delaware Cnty. eventually to route17 where it was hit by a car. Near Livingston Manor if I remember correctly.
 
ROCKYSUMMIT said:
Hey Ralph, was that horse kill very rescent? I hadn't heard about it. Also on moose travels, there was one a few years back that came down through Delaware Cnty. eventually to route17 where it was hit by a car. Near Livingston Manor if I remember correctly.

One made it all the way to Fishkill, where they erected a 'Moose Crossing' sign to commerate the beast crossing Main Street! :eek:
 
Hi Rocky Summit,
It was not this year,maybe last year. Fran Moore,from Del.co.N.Y. told me a couple years ago that a large cat with a long tail jumped out in front of her car on rt.28 just before Bellayre ski center early one morning. It was the color of a deer.I trust her word.A friend of mine lifted a track of one with plaster from mud.Very convincing in deed ,that was taken locally.I have yet to see a track,and I get out alot,and in different areas,but that does not mean anything,when there are only a couple in the whole region.
 
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Ive seen 2 lions in the wild, I can assure you they are alot bigger then you expect them to be. :eek:
 
mountain lion sightings in Pennsylvania

funkyfreddy said:
concerning sightings in Pennsylvania. I have been hearing about sightings there for years...
[ QUOTE]

Freddy-- Two weeks ago I visited the Henry Foundation in Gladwynne PA. This is a wooded estate and horticultural preserve in a wooded suburb of Philadelphia which "enjoys" a large deer herd. A person in residence there had directly seen a mountain lion recently, also a few years ago. There was also witness of a deer kill. The deer herd has abruptly left the area. A Fish and Wildlife agent was skeptical. I did see remains of a deer kill, carcass totally stripped.

Walt
 
"The question is not whether they are here, but where they came from." --J. Harrigan

Closer to home (for me), here's John Harrigan's column in today's North Country NH newspapers concerning his experience collecting cougar stories over the last 20 years. This is subscription only, so I can't link; I've edited out the middle section with Harrigan's list of older sightings. If you're interested I'll PM it to you.


[start quote]
North Country Notebook
Another tale on the trail of the elusive cougar
by John Harrigan

02/22/2006 - On a July day this past summer, Bob Elwell and a neighbor had just finished mowing a field in East Lancaster, and Bob was picking up various stray bits of debris while his dog scouted around.

Something caught the dog's attention, and it made straight for the edge of the woods and then stopped dead and sat down, still as a statue.

Bob looked over and saw himself staring straight into the eyes of a mountain lion. "I thought at first that my mind was playing tricks with my body," he said. "I couldn't believe what I was seeing."

Bob's sighting was a classic, one of the best I've heard over more than decades of reporting and writing about cougars. I have a standard list of questions and criteria intended to weed out the best of the best. His occurrence passes with flying colors.

The cat was about 30 yards away. It had a black muzzle and its ears were flat. It was tawny in color and the size of a good-sized German shepherd. "But it was the tail that removed any doubt," Bob said, "a good three feet long."

The cougar appeared to have no concern at all for the dog. It held its gaze for 15 to 20 seconds and moved off into the woods, in no particular hurry.

Like many North Country residents, particularly outdoor people and farmers, Bob had heard about cougar sightings, including one by a neighbor, but never thought he'd see one himself. "I just couldn't believe how lucky I was," he said.

So I've added Bob's experience to my list of the best of the best. Here are some others. . . .[edited out for brevity]

Along with a host of hunters, loggers, farmers and other people who spend a lot of time in the outdoors, I have no doubts at all that there are several big cats cruising the northern New England region or even calling it home (there have been several reports of adults with kittens). And I think it's only a matter of time before solid evidence is collected (scat, hair, a good photograph or video) or one gets hit in the road.

Canadian officials have verified four cougars, two in southern Quebec and two in the Maritimes, via DNA analysis on hair collected at artificially scented scraping posts. Mountain lions, like wolves, acknowledge no boundaries.

To me, the question is not whether cougars are here, but where they came from. I prefer to think they're resurgents from the remnants of the original Eastern cougar, pushed to the limits of extinction after the turn of the last century but somehow managing to hang on. Eventually, over time, the DNA will tell the story. [end quote]
 
nice article. It is quite annoying to hear of people killing wild animals for being too close to their property when the people themselves have moved inot teh habitat of these wild animals. If you dont want wild life in your yard, then dont move there. It probably would have been just as easy to walk back into your house than to pull out a gun and kill the animal. No where in teh article did it say the cat was being agressive twords the people.
 
Pictures of feline tracks on Engine Hill

When we hiked out of Rocky Branch shelter iup the back side of Engine Hill
in Decwmber 4 years ago, we saw feline prints. It was unique in that they were fresh and they were in a trace of new snow which had just started falling.
Also we got photos of the prints next to a ski pole basket for use as a size reference.
If interested Ill email the pic to you as I dont know how to post it here.
(If that's possible let me know how and Ill post it for all to view.)
CS
 
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