Its OK, he told me. It has, in fact, more names than any animal in the world. For several years, Blodgett, a wildlife biologist with the Vermont Department of Fish & Wildlife, conducted those follow up investigations. If there is a follow up investigation, it turns out that people were mistaken about what they saw.. Sue Morse, a professional animal tracker, believes that means cougars will, eventually, return to Vermont. Vermont Mountain Lion Sightings Probably are lions in western NC, too. Respect predators, protect them but dont worship or try to hug them! Ottmann and I walked farther. Long Trail beat Arlington 62-40 on Feb. 7. [An overabundance of deer] means our forests are getting older and older and not being replaced. He also points to the influx of invasive plant species in New England as evidence of an out-of-control deer population. They were inevitably fleeting. I also know of someone who said they showed F&G a photo of one from a game camera in NH. Betty folded his arms across his chest, where they rose and fell and rose again with his breathing. No doubt of what it was; size, color and recognizable tail. 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). Most of those sightings were misidentifications, Doug Blodgett says. If theyre in one, theyre in the other.. They are here & ..just a matter of time with photo or kill on a highway/road. Vermont Mountain Lion Sightings. Tried to see "mountain lion" and agree that what appears to be a long tail is most likely the . I was curious enough at the time to do a little research. I had been the first vehicle in a line held up by one lane traffic on a bridge reconstruction. Morse founded Keeping Track in the belief that getting citizens interested and engaged in wildlife will have the knock-on effect of getting them interested and engaged in how land-use decisions affect wild populationsand might provide the impetus for conservation efforts. I saw a Mountain Lion in 2007 in Northfield, MA at the junctions of Rtes 10 and 63. 2,110 likes. Refuge volunteer Dale Erz originally. Everglades Panther [Betty] and the other guys dont do this shit. They are much larger than bobcat and lynx, young adults can still have spots too. There is a reason that millions of people were afraid to go in the water after they saw the movie Jaws. It was fast as hell but there was no mistaking its not only long,but THICK tail as it disappeared into the woods. She IS, perhaps, the most knowledgeable and experienced person in this arena and I listened intently to her presentation (Richmond, VT 2018). In Vermont, for instance, a few dozen wild turkeys from Pennsylvania were released in 1969 and multiplied into the thousands we have here now. Green Mountain Lion Corporation, Inc. Business Consulting and Services Williston, Vermont 5,563 followers Boutique management recruiting firm focusing on heavy equipment manufacturing & distribution. They are most definitely here. Feb 28, 2023 4:00 am By Robert Spencer 1 Comment. You dont even have to go out and look for it.. Others have seen cougar in neighboring towns . Its mounted carcass is on display in Montpelier where Id seen it when I was the adult supervision for my daughters sixth-grade class trip to the capital. Reported mountain lion sightings are popping up all over Vermont and convinced onlookers say the proof is in the pictures. His Tail was very long almost touching the ground and as thick as velvet rope. Americans called the mountain " Tah-wak-be-dee-ee-wads. They knew what they were doing, Blodgett says. One cat will leave more than 10,000 tracks per day. 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. I have learned one thing in my career, and thats to never say never, she said. 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. No An official form of the United States government. Something I had not expected ever to experience. Its not my call. If these animals are not in the habitat, what we see is an overabundance of herbivores., The ecologist John Laundre, who has spent 35 years studying cougars, concurs. Inslerman said the DEC received about a half-dozen calls reporting sightings of mountain lions last year; two calls this week. Besides, Ottmann had revealed that hed been charged by a bear in this same piece of woods, and I felt conflicted about diverting my gaze from the underbrush. Running into a mountain lion can be a scary experience. In fact, jaguars used to be native to south Texas, as well! Ive heard some biologists say it is not a distinct subspecies. Probably because of all the hunters that would be out trying to get their trophy and endangering others. It had traveled, certainly, though Minnesota and Wisconsin and, who knows, perhaps even Vermont and might, then, have accounted for some of those sightings. Interesting article, but it is really incomplete without a discussion of the legal implications of having a confirmed endangered species such as the Eastern Cougar in New England. But, I think with education and planning, we should reintroduce wolves and cougar in the Northeast. This is a site for people to discuss mountain lion sightings in the Green Mountain State of Vermont. At least once a year thered be a story from somewhere, but I only ran the absolute best, he told me. And, then, some species didnt need any help from humans but managed to extend their range into now-recovered and suitable habitats. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); This setting should only be used on your home or work computer. The cat is dead. Big kitty. Or, if it does, when that will be. Videos. And, now, here I was. I noticed that there were many great websites, blogs, and discussion boards devoted to mountain lion sightings in other states of New England, but not one just for Vermont. Mountain Lions - Rocky Mountain National Park (U.S. National Park Service) NPS.gov Park Home Learn About the Park Nature Animals Mammals Mountain Lion Mountain Lion Last updated: May 4, 2018 Was this page helpful? 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. The mountain lionalso known as the cougar, puma, panther, or catamountis a large cat species native to the Americas. 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. He didn't want to dispute what people are saying they saw, he simply says they need proof to substantiate it. His mention of these encounters was so matter-of-fact that I found myself nodding along. No need since so we guess it has moved on from the northeast corner of Connecticut. What time of day was it? Honestly, leaving this out of your article would seem to perpetuate the notion that there is a conspiracy to keep us all in ignorance. There were pine cones on window sills, a well-used hatchet and a variety of animal figurines on display, and, near the television, a stack of videos including. One summer I saw what I assumed was the same cougar several different times in my neighborhood which was near a long strip of woods along I 91 and used to be a large open field across the road from our home. There was no denying that the carcass, which was examined by experts, was that of a mountain lion. Not many, but then there dont have to be many to make humans aware of the danger and, often, over-react. The tails gotta be there. Ive never forgotten that and told it to many folks over the years, most of whom, I must say, thought I was hallucinating I guess but, it/he/she was a fact in Longmeadow, MA that summer long ago. How did I know? My parents friend in Deposit, NY, posted a young catamount sitting on the front porch on Facebook. I think I may have pissed her off since I was up in that area X2 this week. 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. Still, sightings are common. Several years ago, I was bicycling with a buddy up Quabbin Reservoirs Administration Rd. Defenders of Wildlife developed funding to support wolf predation on cattle which I believe worked. I could hear the steady rush of traffic on Route 315. Hes also unafraid to take unpopular positions when he deems it necessary: Shortly before our meeting, hed signed a petition in favor of keeping ATVs off public roads. No way to proveor disproveit. Typical species behavior is for males to disperse from an area when the population reaches the carrying capacity of the habitat. Chance of snow 90%. I moved very carefully to get my hand in my pocket and my fingers around the glasses. If we end up with a population, it will be the result of a colonizer female who gets here somehow, some way, and the rest will be history.. There were pine cones on window sills, a well-used hatchet and a variety of animal figurines on display, and, near the television, a stack of videos including Life of a Predator and The African Lion. People like you are the problem and cause of extinctions. And, he says, if they were here, wouldnt one have been killed on one of the states highways where cars and trucks travel some 9 million miles every year? It was too far away and the light was too poor for me to know exactly what I was looking at. As I turned a corner going north toward Waterbury, I saw the cat come up from the cornfield, saunter across the highway, turn and look in my direction and then amble off into the brush. It can run at speeds of up to 50 mph. Phone: . If theres a middle ground in the cougar debate, it belongs to John Harrigan, a veteran outdoorsman, newspaper reporter, and widely read syndicated columnist. The guide told him earlier in the summer he and a couple clients had watched a moutain lion come down to the bank of the Deerfield River just upstream and take a small deer, fawn, drag it into the woods and it kill it, they could hear the screams of the deer as the cougar finished the job. As I walked thru the beginning of the trail I spooked a deer and heard this awful screech and slowly backed out of there .. I had been foraging up in an area that is rocky. There was no tracking microchip implanted in the animals body, which is usually the case with captives. I saw an adult cougar/catamount twice within a two week period. The glasses I carried were of good quality with exceptional light-gathering property. Yet I also remembered something Sue Morse had told me months before, as we sat in her living room drinking beer and chatting cats. But this requires a breeding pair. Ordinary, the lone males do not range much more than 100 miles. But other hard evidence of the big cats presence is elusive. Among the mountain lions typical behaviors is the way it will revisit, for several days, the carcass of an animal it has killed, moving it and cacheing it until there is nothing left to eat or the flesh has turned. There is no shortage of deer for all apex predators whether they are canine, feline, or human. The reasons for this conspiracy vary depending upon whom you talk to, but they coalesce around the idea that wildlife agencies would be inconvenienced by the cougars presence, as theyd be forced to respond in ways that would tax their resources. Westford, MA, crossing Dunstable Rd from Long Sought For Pond into the woods. With all the thousands of trail cameras in the woods of New England, one would think that there would be at least one picture taken of a catamount. Well, theres no difference between Maine and New Brunswick, anyway, said Betty. It can run 50 miles an hour and clear a twelve-foot fence. There was a tin of American Spirit tobacco on the table (Ottmanns), a laptop (Bettys), a notebook (mine), and a tumbler of Bacardi and Coke (Ottmanns again). Wildlife do really crazy things, and you just never know.. The habitat is certainly right, with so many farms having gone by and so much formerly cleared land returning to second growth forest and with the populations of prey species suchas deer and porcupines having reached abundant proportions. Black markings decorate the tip of the tail, ears, and around the snout. Height. The deer dont eat the exotics, but they eat the competitors. I wondered why he didnt just stop & cuff that pesky dog up side of his head surely he couldve held his own, tho they were about the same size. In Vermont, it was 1881. When I came out, the cat appeared in front of me coming up a rise (incredibly close to some ski condos). They were also reluctant to certify that turkey and moose had returned the Quabin reservoir lands for many years after locals reported seeing them. The animal, I learned, is called many things: mountain lion, panther, catamount, puma, cougar and more. What set it off was a National Geographic special on mountain lions in California, right after my daughter and I had two encounters in my driveway, Betty told me. It can run 50 miles an hour and clear a twelve-foot fence. Using DNA and physical evidence, state environmental officials said they determined that the animal likely trekked more than 1,500 miles from South Dakota, a journey that was captured by trail camera (above). Put bluntly, Morse does not believe that New England is home to cougars. 3 talking about this. Can they really all be cases of false identification? Things seem to move at twilight and you never know. Beautiful animal. Ive attended talks with Sue Morse. I only saw the back side, but he was huge. I started to get nervous so I was scanning the area low and high in the trees. It continues in Connecticut, where that South Dakota cat was killed in 2011, and in Massachusetts, despite two credible reports in the past quarter century (in one case, DNA-confirmed scat; in the other, verified tracks). and with my friend Chris Christinat who lives in hartsville we saw one stalking a rabbit on her lawn about autumn of 2009. Betty was quiet, and I wondered if even he, a man who does not doubt the presence of these cats in our midst and who himself claims multiple sightings, thought Ottmann was exaggerating. This was after the department sent him out west to study the behavior of mountain lions. Matthew Johnson/Vermont Historical Society. All those deer hunters represent a kind of ad hoc search party. This animal was too long in the body and blunt in the head. And, in the real world, a black bears fatal attack on a hiker in New Jersey last year made many people reconsider their warm feelings for that animal. But that was OK. Bo Ottmann knew they were out there. 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. The females are where its at, she said. When a cats around, its not hard to find evidence. In Vermont, in the late 19th century, this meant, especially, sheep. A 2,000 Mile Journey There was never, of course, a photograph. Videos - Industry Stories; Find Candidates; The scientific name for the catamount is Puma concolor. Early spring 2019 I caught a glimpse of one entering over grown brush on the side of the road very very early in the morning. That animal in Connecticut makes for a pretty fantastic story but it takes more than one dispersing male. So you can imagine there. If there was an animal out there, killing stock, he would find it., This man, and others, taught Blodgett how to look for sign and, he says, You learn pretty quickly that if there is an animal in the area, it will leave sign. 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. Maybe, I thought, but the shape seemed wrong. But my eyes picked up something and I knew, right away, that it was alive. Because he lives among them, Harrigan understands that no one knows the woods better. Vermont Girls' School Strikes Back Against the Trans Madness. 5-7 yards from me. 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Black markings decorate the tip of the big cats presence is elusive look for it.. Others have seen in!
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