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cougars, now this is getting STUPID

teeroy

teeroy

Life Member
8 counties in southern iowa (lucas, wayne, clarke, adams, warren, monroe, decatur, and appenoose) want to impose a bounty on mountain lions. the paranoia continues! since they aren't protected, or regulated by the DNR, the majority of hunters will take one, given a chance. a bounty will increase hysteria, and open the door to fraud. people from neighboring counties, and states will try to pass off cougars shot elsewhere for the bounty (i know i would), wich will cause inflated cougar estimations in the state, and will cause the DNR to set regulations, wich is not needed. the lions are here, not alot, but some. they have most likely been here alot longer than people have thought, and have only recently begun to attract attention. the lions that have been killed have all been young males, and with iowa's small number of lions, means VERY few females, and a young lion(much like myself) ain't gonna hang around too long if there are no females present. the majority of the lions are passing through, cruising for food and ladies. we may have a few hundred lions in iowa one week, and within a few days, have only a few dozen. they can cover hundreds of miles in a few days.

the article is in today's (wed.oct 20) des moines register.
 
i read a article where they said a male lion will travel up to 700 miles they said that they track one from ok. to iowa
shocked.gif
 
Southern Iowa officials contemplate mountain lion bounties



DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) -- State officials say residents of southern counties calling for bounties for dead mountain lions are overreacting, that there aren't that many wandering the state.

State biologist Ron Andrews said the farmers and others pushing for the bounties are victims of "puma paranoia."

There may be as few as 10 mountain lions in Iowa, he said, and the reclusive cats present little risk.


Since 1995, Iowa has recorded several hundred unconfirmed sightings of mountain lions, also called cougars or pumas.

Iowa has no history of mountain lions attacking people; however, some Iowans began to worry after January news reports about two bicyclists being mauled by a cougar in California.

Supporters of bounties of $100 to $150 for mountain-lion carcasses say they've seen plenty of the cats in Iowa, and the scratches they've left on cattle.

They want to encourage hunters to kill the animals before the cats eat children. They are checking with the state attorney general's office to make sure they can set the bounty.

"We have had a lot of mountain lion sightings in this area," said Dan Kent, a Chariton farmer and real-estate agent who is pushing a bounty in Lucas County.

"We just have too many of them, and they aren't protected, so we thought we'd be proactive and have some of the people take some of them out," he said. "A bounty would bring in some hunters."

The issue has become so heated in some parts of Iowa that a combined 600 people showed up to talk about their concerns about mountain lions at two recent meetings with state biologists -- one in Chariton and one in Iowa City. Lucas County officials also recently met with 35 elected officials from southern Iowa to discuss a region-wide bounty.

Representatives of Lucas, Wayne, Clarke, Adams, Warren, Monroe, Decatur and Appanoose counties attended the bounty meeting.

"Lately, it's been the hot topic," said Cathy Reece, chairwoman of the Lucas County Board of Supervisors. "We get a report of a sighting about once a week."

Adams County Supervisor Mark Olive, who runs a print shop, said a recent dog killing in his area happened near a set of what appeared to be cougar prints. A sick calf shot by a farmer was dragged a couple of hundred yards before he could bury the animal the next day.

"I feel we need to take care of it now before we have 10 times as many of them," Olive said. "It's going to be a problem. They are here.

"We do mushroom-hunting, and we have kids out there. If you get between the mother cougar and the kids, look out," Olive added.

Mountain lions are known to be fond of deer and to attack horses or cattle on occasion. They also eat small animals such as rabbits. In rare cases, they have mistaken children, or even adults, for prey.

The Humane Society of the United States and other groups have opposed shooting cougars, contending that people are much more likely to be attacked by dogs.

However, mountain lions are not protected in Iowa. Anyone using legal firearms and following the usual laws on where guns can be used can shoot one without penalty.

Iowa authorities know of only two cougars being shot in Iowa -- one last year in Sioux County and one in January in Wayne County. There are no confirmed cases of livestock or human deaths caused by mountain lions.

Information from: The Des Moines Register, http://www.desmoinesregister.com

AP-CS-10-20-04 0153EDT
 
If you hunt in these counties then you better hope that they do not start the bounties cause it will really hurt your deer hunting. People will start coming in from over states such as OK, AR, and even MO. They will bring in dogs that will chase these cats and any other wildlife in the area. You say oh but my hunting spot is private, it doesn't matter these dogs will jump fences and run for miles chasing these cats. I say let the cats be. I have no gurantee but I would say a attack in the wild here in Iowa is slim to none.
 
i don't say let them be, but i don't see a need to change any rules/laws, or raise bounties. let hunters take one when they want, or are able, and see what happens. they have been here for quite awhile, and how many have hunters seen, or killed?
 
I heard on the Van and Bonnie AM 1040 radio show this morning on the way to work that tomorrow morning they are doing a thing where they are teaming up with WHO-TV 13 on seeing if they can find an actual cougar. Supposedly so many people are saying they are seeing them on the outskirts of Des Moines that Van and Bonnie are wanting people who can confirm seeing a real one to call into the radio station and tell them and they are going to have Chopper 13 the TV 13's helicoper go check it out. If they can actually get one on film the radio station is going to give the person that called in with the info a Mercury Cougar Car. I personaly know Van and Bonnie and I was going to ask them today at work about it to see if what they were saying was true but forgot to. Guess if I hear anything I'll pass it on...
 
I realy don't understand all the hysteria about cougars here in Iowa. I have talked to a DNR biologist running a bobcat study in southern Iowa and he belives that there may be a very few cougars that wander or migrate through the state but that there is not a resident population. He told us that there have been 4 cougars killed in the state, 2 by hunters and 2 road kills. One hunter kill was confirmed as a wild cat, one was questionable, and 2 were declawed domestic or pets.
I personaly feel that all this crazy talk about attacks on live stock and people are just justification for some one to kill some thing that is different and that they don't understand. I have camped and hunted in several western states that have real cougar populations and never once heard any one express any of this type of fear being expressed here. Bears were a much more advertized danger in most camp grounds because there had actually been incidents. In Glacier National park there was a person killed by a bear several years ago in our camp ground but never a cougar attack. I would think that in our area coyote packs would represent a much greater risk to children in the woods than cougars and I don't see a bounty on them. I don't understand why some one would want to kill a cougar here if they saw one rather than just saying "Wow that's cool I wish my kid could see that" and let some one else share the experience and wonder.
 
Here's an article that was sent to me by a friend.



MOUNTAIN LION/COUGAR HOAXES RUNNING RAMPANT OVER THE INTERNET
> By Ron Andrews
> Furbearer Resource Biologist
> Iowa Department of Natural Resources
>
> Yes, Iowans, there have been three mountain lions/cougars killed in our
> state. One was road-killed in the late summer of 2001 near Harlan, one
> shot near Ireton in northwest Iowa in November 2003, and one shot near
> Chariton in south central Iowa in early 2004.
>
> But the rumors and false stories from all corners of Iowa claim
> mountain lions/ cougars are everywhere. These rumors rate a zero on the
> Fact-O-Meter. What is the status of mountain lions/ cougars in Iowa?
> First, there may be a few others out there, but very few compared to all
> the wild rumors.
>
> Iowa mountain lions/ cougars are from two possible sources. Either
> captive animals kept as "pets" that have escaped or been
> intentionally released, or perhaps a few long distance dispersing
> animals from their native areas in the Black Hills of South Dakota,
> western Rocky Mountain States or southwest Texas. Of the many reports
> of mountain lion/cougar sightings that we (DNR) receive, the "lion's
> share" cannot be authenticated or verified by tracks or photos or
> other hard evidence. For a fish and game agency to confirm reported
> sightings, we have to have hard evidence such as a track, photo or
> something concrete.
>
> To confuse the issue further, some people are using the Internet to
> send mountain lion/cougar photos saying the photos are of mountain
> lion/cougars taken in Iowa, when in fact they have been taken elsewhere.
> Here is a description of the two most common photos that have been
> circulating the web. One is of a man holding up (bear hugging) a large,
> dead mountain lion/cougar in a garage. That particular cougar was
> killed in Washington state several years ago. But through Internet
> rumor and gossip circles, that animal has apparently been killed in
> every southern Iowa county as well as in more than a half dozen states
> in the mid and south central United States.
>
> The second more recent photo shows a mountain lion/cougar following
> very closely behind a deer and claims to have been taken with a trail
> master camera near Albia, and probably several other Iowa communities as
> well. But taking a closer look at that photo, one can see the deer is a
> mule deer (black coloration on the tail) that inhabit the western United
> States, not Iowa, and the habitat is a fairly dense conifer stand, which
> is not typically found in Iowa.
>
> Other mountain lion/cougar rumors and hoaxes indicate that the Iowa
> Department of Natural Resources released many of these animals to reduce
> the deer herd. That is absolutely untrue and ludicrous. We have enough
> common sense to know that politically, such a program would raise the
> ire of many agricultural interests in the state. THE DNR HAS NOT, WILL
> NOT, AND DID NOT RELEASE MOUNTAIN LIONS/ COUGARS IN IOWA.
>
> Also a few words of caution-don't believe everything you read and see
> on the Internet as a lot of it can be just flat out rumor and gossip.
 
i started this thread on another site, and i cannot believe the amount of people (hunters) that think these cats are a serious, legitmate threat to human life. the thought that these animals have no right to be in iowa, and that they are going to eat our children is rediculous.
 
I just attended a seminar on Mt. Lions that was given by a guy from SDSU here at ISU. Very informative and he was talking about some of the radio tracking they have done. He said most of their satallite males displace into Wyoming as well as they can keep track but they did have one on record that went from the black hills to Oklahoma..something like 1100 km. Very interesting stuff. He seemed to be quite humored by the overkill the press is putting on these "sightings" in Iowa. He did say that he wasn't sure about where the cats that were seen in East SD, they were still waiting on tissue samplings to come back. If there are any here in Iowa they are not here in the numbers people think they are in, nor are they even an immeadiate threat to humans in any way.
 
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