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. So nowadays we think of this in the Northeast as crazy stuff that people have a mountain lion as a pet. So. New Hampshire Fish and Game Department says there's no proof. You know you have to have a license and it's hard to get that license a license to own a mountain lion. OK. brings a lot of. 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. Your support makes this news available to everyone. No that's a little bit outside the range. And it was unmistakable. We're going to talk a little bit more about habitat first but then we'll get into sightings. Today on the exchange we discuss what residents may have been seeing and what breeding mountain lion pairs would mean for our ecosystem. Mike you're on the air. But no proof was offered. Deer Bear Moose Wolves Fisher Mountain Lions. Peter Biello: Ok weird question but do they make good pets. The big cat has been extinct here since the mid-1800s. The report came in from a conservation officer. So there is definitely no downward pressure by anyone. John. 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. We've met Fish and Game's BURDEN OF PROOF. And sometimes I've seen pictures of those where it's the question is What is that is that a bobcat. So. Peter Biello: So a little bit of nostalgia maybe for it for a better world embodied in the mountain lion. I have one that's more elaborate than that. Sunny today high temperatures low to mid 80s it'll be clear tonight overnight lows in the 50s for tomorrow sunshine with high temperatures mid to upper 80s. By, March 2023 Fund Drive Rules and Regulations, Persons with disabilities who need assistance accessing NHPR's FCC public files, please contact us at publicfile@nhpr.org. Why are there so many false positives? Caller: And the more I thought about it the color of it it was definitely not a bobcat. Sort of dropped onto the SD card of a camera he'd set up out in the wild. Its closest living relative is the cheetah. Well within there. 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. So what a neat experience. Patrick Tate: Yeah yeah. We'd be inundated with scouts in the past when newspaper articles have been written about DNA and scouts. Yes. So for our scientists to do the lumping and whatnot. 50 feet above the most. Patrick Tate: Well I've never seen an Easter cougar so I can't say when I've handled these 10 cougars and whatnot. You saw what you saw. 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. Peter Biello: Sam I wanted to ask you a little bit about that first and then turn to Patrick Tate efficient game. Many people in New Hampshire have claimed to have seen mountain lions. Caller: Oh hi. Its impossible to say, but I think the odds are pretty good that some of these sightings are legit. So it's six months of a large large predatory animal that moves great distances on the landscape that is not known if it went northeast west Salt and how many circles it did. Caller: I do. The Eastern mountain lion is extinct in the eastern United States and Canada, but in 2011, a . Part II. I would just suggest that in my experience as a reporter covering this covering this issue for a few years at least at what point do we reach a certain critical mass for lack of a better term of accounts where I'm not to suggest that you guys aren't taking this possibility seriously. We'll also hear your stories if you have them again. 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: I cannot recall or see the tail in my in my image of it. Peter Biello: And then it ran away okay. Peter Biello: Nice to be here. And I think a lot of folks would like them to be around. Sam Evans-Brown: But I mean the video I had been sent was you know a recording of a animal growling but it was in slow motion and when I asked the person why is this in slow motion the denied that it was so there's a lot of weird stuff that happens in regards to people claiming they've seen they've seen these things. You don't know what's going on. And I just said I saw I saw they from behind the shoulder all the way past the long tail. It's completely possible that it may have spent time in New Hampshire and went undetected but had it stayed in the area ultimately it would have been detected over time. Mountain lions can be found throughout Arizona, and data suggests the populations are not only stable, but growing. Nicholas Handy can be reached at 924-7172 ext. Chapter X, Predators, Panther (Mountain Lion) From History of NH Game and Furbearers by Helenette Silver, Research Clerk, NH Fish and Game Dept. We'd love to have you in the queue. 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. Michael Brindley is our program manager our producers our Jessica Hunt and Christina Phillips and our theme music was composed by Bob Lord. He played a pivotal role and he battled for recognition. Caller: I have yeah. 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. Peter Biello: Well Mike thanks very much for sharing your story. Have a photo. The nonbelievers are going to say Show us your evidence and show us prove this to us. Yes. BRADFORD, N.H. - All that snow in parts of the Northeast has more than just kids jumping for winter joy. We discuss what residents may have been seeing and what breeding mountain lion pairs would mean for our ecosystem. First off if the standard for an agency to go forward with the public and put out a press release that them outlines here their believers are going to say I told you they'd been here the whole time. For starters, part of the confusion might come from the fact that the eastern cougar was taken off the endangered species list earlier this year. I mean it wasn't your idea. I looked at the picture and asked me what do you see in the picture and I wrote back. We send out DNA samples to the U.S. Forest Service Rocky Mountain Research Station. So I want to start the program with a comment from someone who is not in the studio with us today. The supervisor that hired me in the game division in October of 1978 passed on to me this whole big folder of mountain lion information and sightings going back probably a couple decades. Mountain Lion | Squam Lakes Natural Science Center All exhibit and hiking trails are CLOSED for the season. John if you're still on the line here I was going to I don't. Select image for larger view. Mountain lions don't usually travel more than 100 miles from where they are born. Yeah 13 to 15 years ago 13 to 15 years ago. They don't know the direction they're going. Have you heard stories do you have questions about the mountain line. So give us a call now. 10 things to do in NH this weekend: Dartmouth Dance, Hamilton De Holanda & more, Turkish restaurant in the Upper Valley aims to help those affected by recent earthquakes, RFK Jr. tells NH crowd hes considering a presidential run, Epping woman pleads guilty to threatening Michigan election official in 2020. Which brings us to the next question, what are the odds that some of these reported sightings (which, when I posted about this on twitter, I immediately started to get as well) are actually people seeing a mountain lion? WMUR NH Chronicle Mountain Lions in NH Part I and Part II. The big cat has been extinct here since the mid-1800s. Anyways after three weeks I finally found the image on line on a field and stream photo contest and the explanation in the end was the person that set the camera out with another individual and they believed that someone who knew of the camera location saw the similarities put the can't picture on their SD card so it looked like that camera recorded the image that is. If youve got photo trap evidence of a Mountain Lion, send it in, and we'll send it along to the appropriate state or federal agency! Mountain Lion report and as a biologist for the state that's a situation where if he said to me what did I see. Through DNA they approximate area in the United States or North America where I was born. New Hampshire Public Radio | The DNA the DNA that they were able to pull from the cat suggested that it was a dispersed mountain lion that came. Fish and Game then deny the evidence. Sandy Hodskins, owner of West Meadow Farm in Bradford, New Hampshire, took time from shoveling Wednesday to enjoy the snow with her horse, West Wind. So the whole media hype about how scary mountain lions are should should go away immediately and that would be that I think the major thrust of educating folks about these casualties vs.. Sam Evans-Brown: Sam go ahead. There have been several sightings of mountain lions in New Hampshire recently. We are the second most-forested state in the country, and those forests can be impenetrable snarls (part of why the Northeast is notoriously a difficult place to hunt deer), and while there are people in a lot of those woods, because the cats have been absent for a few generations now, most of those people dont know what a cougar scrape or latrine look and smell like. But I do think that it's appropriate that a fishing game agency would recognize verifiable proof if they could. And they asked me about the tail which I just did not remember that tail out of that whole experience. The most common areas to see mountain lions in Arizona are in places of rocky and mountainous terrain. There was a lot of DNA evidence. So I would put this in the category of sort of like shark attacks right. Sue Morse: The big cat really commands the utmost respect not so much fear but fascination. They lived perhaps elsewhere in New England and they were just passing through and happened to have an encounter of some sort. So let's let's go to the phones. There are mountain lion in Massachusetts. The Connecticut Mountain Lion is the best documented wild Mountain Lion in New England. So so do what you can get to do what you can to get proof. 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. Caller: Hey guys how you doing. And a lot of people around the county airport have seen a lot of pilots coming in said they saw huge. Let's look for other evidence. But my experience was that the majority of these accounts could not be taken lightly. There's no attraction. Caller: It had just left that field and was out. Peter Biello: They make great mascots at least. I was a Bobcat we saw it and I have a picture of it. So try to take photographs if you see something like this. So they're scary. (Cue the X-Files music: The Government is denying the cougars exist!) This decision was primarily for nerdy phylogeny reasons, though, because the eastern cougar probably never existed. For all the men out there that don't realize it. And today we're talking about the mysterious elusive mountain line with folks who know something about it. Verifiable pictures recorded by the observing person or a trail camera. But I was riding a mountain bike not far from my house. So hard to know hard to refute if there's no interest in making up a story which many people of course do then I would respond the same way as Pat did. Peter Biello: Ok. Rick van de Poll: Absolutely. The species that once inhabited the Northeast, known as the eastern mountain lion, is now extinct. We rely on readers like you to support the local, national, and international coverage on this website. Patrick Tate: So Cougar Mountain Lion katama. Patrick Tate: So it's very typical. So one thing I'll add we're talking about natural dispensers but talking with the conservation officer in the 1980s they recall going to a residence telling a person you can live here but your mountain lion can't. What's going on. Mountain Lions in New Hampshire-Fact or Fiction 3,207 views Jul 31, 2019 78 Dislike Share Save New Hampshire Fish and Wildlife 634 subscribers During my thirty-one career at the New. A lot of times. A monthly donation of $5 makes a real difference. What kind of animal is that. Sue Morse: First and foremost if you have color or if you could see details of color look at the front of the face around the Pumas muzzle the muzzle itself is pure white. Rick van de Poll: 80 90. Peter Biello: What about the idea of tourism like us leaving aside the fact that it is not on the Endangered Species Act is it. And because you know things flow downhill and I was pushed to go investigate it more and met with the individual two or three times and there was a bunch of inconsistencies about the photograph. And here we're talking about in this situation we're talking about it migrated from the West. And you know it's rather interesting because certainly there are those you as a case of mistaken identity or they wanted to see something that perhaps they actually didn't. Peter Biello: So Rick seems like you agree that the tail is a big giveaway whether or not it's a mountain lion Absolutely. Caller: Oh yeah. Author of The last woman in the forest on Saturday July 13th at 7 p.m. at Warner town hall Warner historical dawg. Patrick Tate: So I agree with what Sam said in part that their ability to go undetected for amount of time but ultimately it was detected. They're the generalists that made it through both the arrival of the Clovis people with their with their spears and then the Europeans with their guns. Join as a $8 per month sustainer and get our brand-new owl umbrella! Russ, from Sandwich (and Bedford) asks: In Sandwich New Hampshire, everybody has a story about seeing a mountain lion. Thanks very much. HOLDERNESS, N.H. (AP) Two of the known mountain lions in New Hampshire have spent their 15 years in close proximity to humans. From: Boomerdog in OK 08-Oct-07 Peter Biello: Well John thanks very much for the story really appreciate it. They absolutely do. Infinite Scroll Enabled. m from a weed family Automotive on store Street in Concord is serving the Concord area families automotive needs since 1995. I wasn't employed as biologists at the time of a situation that's been reported but so I started digging into this report and spoke with another wildlife biologist with the agency and said Do you know anything about this. Thanks for your call. Wed love to be part of the first verified sighting. So so they're just a very resilient species and they're pretty they're pretty neat. Residents believe cougars still roam New Hampshire's forests. There's no logic for why they'd be listed as an endangered species. Thank you. The western mountain lion lives in a more of a grassland open area now so to blend in with a very lighted situation here in the Northeast we are very shadowy dark situation because of the forest and our cats wear a darker brownish reddish color than what they were and they were also smaller than what the western mountain lion is. Listeners we'd love to hear some of your thoughts on this. Somewhere the way they travel the things they do they're going to leave evidence. My wife and I saw a mountain lion. So I just throwing that out there it's interesting. Really appreciate you guys being here as well. As recently as 2011 there was one young male mountain lion that cruised all the way from the black hills of South Dakota, up over the Great Lakes, down through New Yorkgetting spotted all. Peter Biello: We at this e-mailed comment from Michael. So you want identifiable backgrounds. Fear for others and those two polarizing opinions on the situation is what I believe brings out mystique and Sam you know I take kind of a long view on this. Here it is. Well let's talk a little bit about that. Some argue that it's a leap of faith. So and so they so they do get pretty involved. www.wildlife.state.nh.us, Buy or Renew Your Saltwater Fishing License, Great Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve. Patrick Tate: I've had hunters hang deer carcasses forbidding wildlife entries. Sam Evans Brown. Patrick Tate: My line being a large predator a cat watch ambush his prey animal that hasn't been. It's good to talk to you. They used to roam the entire continent, but have become extinct in most US states. They just end up in these places. Caller: Absolutely. So it is possible to see male Mountain lions roam into the northeast - there was one hit by a car in CT a number of years back - but we don't have a breeding population of Mountain lions in New England. So hey, just me shooting from the hip, maybe there are a couple mountain lions skulking about. Is there something particularly hospitable about New Hampshire Forests that make them want to come here. You know I'm like seriously I can't get a picture of the thing but what it what it is. Its actually fairly reasonable to believe that mountain lions do, at least, pass through occasionally. Peter Biello: Or send us an email exchange at an HP board. I'm Peter B yellow. So for me as a person who's had the Bobcats right off my grits similar carries sticks to a bobcat The Long Tail obviously very different but those facial markings were overlapping for me. And that the Florida panther was more closely related to the eastern outline than the western mountain lion was. Have you seen one. What gets confusing is when you have a large adult animal and a smaller juvenile animal of a different species you can now step start beginning talking about overlapping body weights and sizes. Peter Biello: The number is 1 800 8 9 2 6 4 7 7. But on the other side of that coin there is this sense that there have been so many sightings locally and you guys Patrick you might recall the name the Wyndham McCracken she kind of turned herself into a local authority off authorities the right word but she was very dedicated to this. Phone number 1 800. And now that everyone and their mother has a remote camera in their back yard its just so, so unlikely that there are resident, breeding mountain lions in New England that are living invisibly among us, he says, Its become Big Foot.. 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. Patrick Tate: No downward pressure at all I think actually Sean turned up and we found the evidence there a number of people would finally say finally we can put this debate to bed. Sam Evans-Brown has been working for New Hampshire Public Radio since 2010, when he began as a freelancer. David Erler says some of them probably have. 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. People go through great lengths to create hoaxes like this. So and so the idea that they can follow up on every individual sighting is just crazy right. Okay. Peter Biello: So let's say Rick that it was confirmed that there that there are mountain lines here in New Hampshire. They're just moving around freely. Think you've seen a mountain lion. John is calling from Bennington. And you know all that. However, as far as I can tell theres no Deep State Conspiracy to cover up a breeding population of cougars in the Granite State. Let us know your story and share your photos! The way that we define species has undergone a revolution with the advent of DNA testing. And in fact in 2011 when it was announced that the eastern cougar was officially extinct the reason that announcement was made is because they said really that it never existed. 44-H Links. Residents Report Mountain Lion Sighting By Elysia Rodriguez Published August 11, 2015 A southern New Hampshire neighborhood believes a mountain lion is roaming the woods near their homes. Since 1917, Lions clubs have offered people the opportunity to give something back to their communities. The second story window through about 30 feet away from it. 19 Erler is a senior naturalist at the Squam Lakes Natural Science Center in Holderness. And then just up behind it you know at about 11 o'clock on one side and whatever that would be on the other side it's black. Peter Biello: This is the exchange on an PR. And those and that's how you can go from a story that Pat says I have nothing to say about that to a story that you know could be the first verified sighting in over 100 years. They are the same thing. Support for an age PR comes from you our listeners. 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. There is some information that suggests that it spent a portion of its time in Massachusetts near the Claiborne reservoir. Despite numerous reports, the NH Fish and Game Department continues to have no physical evidence of mountain lion presence in the state. NHPR is nonprofit and independent.