Yep poor study. North Dakota shows confirmed sightings.. I sure hope so being they have a open season on them.

Nebraska has a well-established and state-documented breeding population, and we have a regular controlled harvest season because of sustained numbers. It's all on our state's Game and Parks website, which is easily searchable.
Mark I'm not sure what this group is smokin' either.


Jim

I know Kentucky has had one because the game department killed one about 10 years ago on the east end of the state.

Whether it is accurate or not sure makes wolves a minor major predator with 20-30K of lions scattered over 30 states. Interesting that TX show no confirmed sightings. Also SD has a fairly robust population which can provide dispersal lions to several neighboring states.

Bryce

2000 in WY? A 1/4 of those must be in our co.

Washington State has no idea what it's cougar population is. They claim 1500.

About 20 years ago they banned hound hunting of cougars, at that time Washington had a robust cougar population, and hound hunters were killing several hundred a year; lets say 500. It is well known that the cougar population has increased substantially in the past 20 years or so.

Let's just assume that the population hasn't gone up in the past 20 years. That would mean that hunters were killing 1/3 (500 out of 1500) of the total population annually when hounds were being used; ridiculous.

"Boot hunters" alone are now killing about 200 annually, and that isn't counting for the substantial number of SSS incidents.

I personally knew one of Washington's cat bios several years ago, the State claimed him as a lynx specialist; he was as dumb as a box of rocks; don't even get me started on that subject.

^^^^
And British Columbia and Washington.

They are a cool looking animal And hey can be very elusive as they go about surviving in the wild Where it is legal to hunt them I would consider them to be a trophy animal They are also a great tool for the anti hunters They are perfect for using their cuteness as a means to steal money for uninformed people .Predators do one thing well They kill and eat whatever they are able to catch. The livestock ,the chickens the family cats and dogs and the toddler all resemble the next meal . If we do not at least keep them in fear of people it will lead to some tragic situations down the road .And it could happen quick .The coyote n PA was not common in the more suburban parts of PA BUT SLOWLY THE COYOTE ADAPTED TO LIVING WITH PEOPLE . Since that has happen the population has increased by a lot .And if the cougar population grows without fear of humans in the places they are not common now they will fill in open territory in a hury .

Agreed I guess that the female with kittens that was killed on the road some time back was just passing through and taking her kittens for a stroll

Cougars are like all cats; prolific breeders and with the exception of lynx, are very adaptable. They are similar to coyotes; they can live about anywhere that people allow them to.

Look at India with it's very dense human population; they have lots of big cats, both leopards and tigers, and they kill many people each year.

I've met that guy, quite a few years ago. Dumb as a box of rocks is giving him too much credit. I also happened to know a guy who hunts for Washington Fish and Game, he kills around 50 lions a year for them. And that is just in a couple of counties around Spokane. Of course they don't advertise that fact. I'd sold him a couple pups in the past, but won't sell him any more, because states like Washington and Oregon that outlawed hunting them with hounds should have to live with them. The voters voted to outlaw hound hunting, the government shouldn't be able to do it when the sportsman can't.

All that being said, lions while being very hard to eradicate, are one of the easiest animals I know of to hurt the population by overhunting. The only reliably successful way to hunt them is with hounds, but most houndmen realize that the population can be easily hurt and they tend to "farm" their lions (in this part of the country, in places like the sheep country of Wyoming that I hunt, they kill most of them, as the sheep ranchers really want them gone. But sheep manufacture predators, I swear, you can run traps, posion, hounds, airplanes, everything that you can think of, and if there is sheep predators will show up from the next state over.) to keep a decent hunting population.

When we could trap and keep lions, I would see an increase in deer,elk and other wildlife if I caught a female, if I caught a male things didn't seem to change. This is only one location where they seem to really like and I have limited experience but I could catch and hold them in my coyote traps, now I keep track of them on camera and a change in the wildlife habits. Miss my old dog he caught me a lot of fur---and three lions!

Here is the one from Kentucky a location where I hunt and trap is not far from where it was killed. I had lion tracks showing up the year before it was killed. I was on the Virginia,West Virginia state line and not far from the Kentucky line.

I see there are no cougars in Indiana, but I had one cross the road in front of me a few years ago. A couple of years later they were sighted several times in my area. Sometimes one and sometimes a female with cubs.
I know what I saw as it was only a dozen yards away when it crossed the road.