Mountain Lion Hunting

A concerned citizen called the Palm Beach County Sheriff's office to report that a Loxahatchee man was storing a cougar in his freezer. The man had permits to possess cougars and other wildlife on his property. Florida Fish and Wildlife Officials inspect facilities that have permits twice a year. When officers came to inspect they did not find any signs of cruelty or neglect.

Running on a trail behind her house, Victoria Clark was looking at her feet, when suddenly she looked up and was face to face with a cougar. The young female cougar took off and later that day the cougar was again seen by Clark's house. A game warden used a deer carcass, assumed to have been killed by the cougar as bait for a trap he set nearby.

Cougars are not strangers to Sudden Valley in Washington. A large population of deer live in the wooded ravines, a perfect habitat for mountain lions. This cougar was not causing problems, or killing pets, but it was killing deer close to homes, and usually cougars do not allow themselves to be seen, where this one was grooming itself near homes.

Earlier this year the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services declared that cougars were extinct in eastern United States. This summer there was a cougar killed in Connecticut, then with some research that cougar was traced to South Dakota. Now Bruce Bohannon, a resident of Swanzey says he encountered a cougar in Keene, New Hampshire.

This was not his first encounter either. He states that after this recent encounter he is sure that last winter he saw a cougar in Westmoreland while grooming snowmobile trails.

Alan McCarthy meets up with some of his friends for coffee most mornings, usually having three cups. This day he chose to stay a bit longer and have another cup of coffee, by doing this it put him on the road around 8:30 am. He was on Port Albion Road on his way home when he saw a jogger in the middle of the road. At first sight he thought the jogger was playing with a dog, but as he got closer he realized the woman was fighting off a cougar. As McCarthy drove up the cougar took off.