Or years or so. Today, their range stretches from the Yukon Territory in Canada along the western coast of the United States, all the way to the Southern Andes in Chile. Peter Biello: Ok weird question but do they make good pets. You need a permit to have that. Just. We discuss what residents may have been seeing and what breeding mountain lion pairs would mean for our ecosystem. There's always been physical evidence to prove those situations like hair or fur scat hair prints pictures of the animal print scat hair. WMUR uLocal: On this trail cam video, an unidentified feline is spotted. And I just said I saw I saw they from behind the shoulder all the way past the long tail. So Marty can you see what I'm getting at is the public sees different names and thinks that they're different animals but it's all the same animal. We did a short segment about mountain lion sightings earlier this year and and after which I was sent a photo and also a video recording that was mostly just audio because it was so dark the photo just a quick reverse Google image search you can put images online and see where else where else they've been posted revealed that the photo had been taking out taken out in Wyoming and has been used you know hundreds of times to claim and the person who sent it to me said it had been taken New Hampshire. Peter Biello: Worth mentioning if we're scaring anybody question a mysterious mountain lions lurking perhaps in someone's backyard. I mean no doubt a seen Bobcat seen his stuff. The report came in from a conservation officer. Because I mean as we've heard in the past 10 minutes like there's there's some disagreement or at least some some vagueness about what an actual mountain lion should appear like in the wild assuming we can even get close enough. He shifted gears in 2016 and began producing Outside/In, a podcast and radio show about the natural world and how we use it. His work has won him several awards, including two regional Edward R. Murrow awards, one national Murrow, and the Overseas Press Club of America's award for best environmental reporting in any medium. So for our scientists to do the lumping and whatnot. No I saw a camel. 1957. 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. 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. Do you want to see real, living mountain lions that do exist in New Hampshire. And so far we have not had any positive mark lion scats or any DNA. Reviewing the evidence, the U.S. There'd be there'd be all sorts of you know basically a lot of hassle required if that were to happen. Patrick Tate: Same here in New Hampshire too. Patrick Tate: In theory it's a passing ball of a court and it goes wherever the bottom Ball wants to go. Fish and Game looked into the labs to have them confirm the information in the reports which the labs did not. Well Is DNA the most reliable means we have of identifying whether or not what we saw is actually a mountain lion. Want to put this to to Patrick Tate who may have heard some some info or info from listeners like you about these these these cats. Information online ad an age student loans dawg. 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. They sent it already. Peter Biello: This is the exchange on an PR. Can you look into this picture. That's what we're seeing is dispersing mountain lions from the West who are just making their way through. Sort of dropped onto the SD card of a camera he'd set up out in the wild. Patrick Tate: So I just got to throw a little interesting side note in this. Its impossible to say, but I think the odds are pretty good that some of these sightings are legit. Sam Evans-Brown: Well first I want to sort of explain why what the theory is but then also throw a bit of cold water on it because I don't think there's much much logic behind it but essentially is that if fish and game were to acknowledge that there was a population of Mount lions in the state there's a chance that something like a listing under the federal Endangered Species Act might happen and then there'd be you know some they'd have to put a plan in place to protect the species there'd be you know restrictions put on development. Mountain Lions in NH. We have evidence and as biologists we would find it quite exciting to find that evidence of one in the state. The Eastern mountain lion is extinct in the eastern United States and Canada, but in 2011, a . We rely on readers like you to support the local, national, and international coverage on this website. And they asked me about the tail which I just did not remember that tail out of that whole experience. Numerous scat and fur specimens have been turned in as part of mountain lion report investigations; DNA identification has shown these submitted samples to be from domestic dog, coyote, bobcat andraccoon. Caller: I have yeah. Rick your thoughts. Almost all species disperse greater distances than females. Just one quick point I think I think when we we talk about these conspiracy theories the real story is that fish and game is an agency that that is short on budget and staff. Reports without physical evidence are not dismissed, however Fish and Game cannot verify a sighting report without physical evidence. Like why would you want one wildlife. The tail leave is a giveaway but not everybody gets to see the tail. They're very loyal to what the handler which makes them very dangerous to everyone else. Wed love to be part of the first verified sighting. So here in New Hampshire when a person turns in something that the Department believes is possible mountain lion and believes it should be investigated further. 44-N Links. So I know it's another unconfirmed report but you string enough of these together. Rick shaking his head so Rick now correct me please. Here she is talking about how to identify a mountain lion. They create these scrapes where theyre communicating with each other with scent. John. It was really muscular looking cat I mean is that like a side angle to me. The species that once inhabited the Northeast, known as the eastern mountain lion, is now extinct. You need you need either a really good photograph or you need you know fresh scat that can be sent to a lab out West that can they can be identified there. Mountain lions when they show up they leave evidence. People go through great lengths to create hoaxes like this. So Pat you field a lot of calls about people seeing or reportedly seeing mountain lions. And what was really remarkable about the whole thing was I was maybe a half mile down on all buildings. However if if and when it does happen it takes up a lot of resources looking at that situation and identifying what's going on because when you start out you don't know it's a hoax. So this whole illegal pet trade black market pro trade thing does does exist in a situation like that can happen. 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. This is where things start breaking down when you so I get pictures with this great description and one of my favorite stories is a great description what the witness and then so I called the witness and wanted information from them and the person says What are you talking about. Tonight, Sean McDonald investigates,. But you won't find evidence of their existence in paw prints in the snow or a deer carcass in a tree. There were several sightings in CT over the last few months. I mean so what what is the practical change that it would bring to New Hampshire if any. Tell us your story. I'm sorry go ahead you're on the air. brings a lot of. But the state always denies it, and none of us know why they deny it. They absolutely do. Each person had their own copy and now it was identify the trees the species of tree matched. Peter Biello: We mentioned that the eastern cougar and the Western cougar are they were separate eastern cougar believed to be extinct. It's not an emerging endangered species no work no there are there are populations in specific states so the Florida panther is is an endangered species that sub population is in fact listed under the Endangered Species Act. I just want to tell you a story that I read. Peter Biello: Hmm. Here it is. Yet this young male traveled about 1,800 miles. HOLDERNESS, N.H. (AP) Two of the known mountain lions in New Hampshire have spent their 15 years in close proximity to humans. NHPR is nonprofit and independent. Some of the reports that I looked into that were actually on file at the local fish and game office were even from people who did not live locally. Sam Evans-Brown: Pretty well I was going to say it is nice to hear about how to identify the facial markings but probably I'd being a to identify the tracks is probably the more useful useful tool that one can have in their tool box. Peter Biello: So let's say Rick that it was confirmed that there that there are mountain lines here in New Hampshire. Peter Biello: Ok. And I I have this great text history of New Hampshire game and fir bears and I think by Helen Silver who used to work for fish and game and she sort of I kind eyes this animal in one of the quotes from 1892 stating that the catamaran was the most ferocious of all the wild beasts of New Hampshire his great size strength and agility of movement together with his formidable weapons rendered him the terror both of man and beast. So there is definitely no downward pressure by anyone. But are there mountain lions living in New Hampshire? I didn't see him online. The big cat has been extinct here since the mid-1800s. So I reached down to grab the camera and looked back and like a ghost it's gone. Patrick Tate: Yeah yeah. Right. Oh you saw him online. Peter Biello: Well John thanks very much for the story really appreciate it. Peter Biello: And Carl before you continue I think Patrick Tate just give me a second. So before we get to the the the the stories of sightings we're getting a lot of calls. About Lions. If so that's for us as an agency. The states never denied mountain lions are here, and theyve never admitted mountain lions are here. This is the exchange. Now again I don't know that there's anything to that. You know perhaps poke around where you saw it and see if you can find a track. Peter Biello: Sam I wanted to ask you a little bit about that first and then turn to Patrick Tate efficient game. So what a neat experience. Sam Evans Brown. Caller: Oh yeah. He says when youve got a mountain lion in town, its kinda obvious. But you won't find evidence of their existence in paw prints in the snow or a deer carcass in a tree. Patrick Tate: I would say well when social media first started they picked up the hoaxes became much more prevalent in the last four or five years hoaxes have died down completely. John is calling from Bennington. Is there something particularly hospitable about New Hampshire Forests that make them want to come here. Over a period of a year and a half, this Mountain Lion left DNA evidence in at least four states. Well they are the same. Thank you very much for listening. Sam Evans-Brown: And when we talk about subspecies this actually leads to to an interesting tangent which is that the field of biology recently has been sort of revolutionized by the use of DNA to determine what subspecies are. And there are thousands of mountain lions killed every year legally through hunting, and there have been untold tens of thousands of mountain lions killed by hunters over the last hundred years, says Mark Elbroch, the Puma Program Director for Panthera, a global wild cat conservation organization, So even the folks who live with mountain lions still have a fancy and see something thats not there to me thats incredible.. New Hampshire Public Radio | She was having a garden party on her back porch and everybody in the party saw this mountain lion across the field down below the porch. We'll also hear your stories if you have them again. Peter Biello: Mm hmm. This is a machine-generated transcript, and may contain errors. They lived perhaps elsewhere in New England and they were just passing through and happened to have an encounter of some sort. 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. The big cat has been extinct here since the mid-1800s. 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. Peter Biello: So Patrick today Fish and Game no downward pressure on you to deny the existence at all costs of mountain lions here in New Hampshire. He told me that on one of his many scouting trips for Black Bear he found a deer carcass up in a tree. Caller: It had just left that field and was out. They kill big animals. Administrative Links. And that's this morning at 10:00 here on NH PR. Peter Biello: Or send us an email exchange at an HP board. Okay. Current conditions in New Hampshire would support a mountain lion, according to Tate, as forests have returned, allowing for prey species to become more prevalent. From involving members in projects as local as cleaning up an area park or as far-reaching as bringing sight to the world's blind, Lions clubs have always . I mean there was this one lady I remember and tough tomorrow. It is also known as cougar, panther, mountain lion, and puma, though catamount is the preferred regional vernacular. Theres a project called the Cougar Network that tracks verified sightings, and they are all around us: Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, New York and New Brunswick have all had verified sightings over the past 20 years or so. Its closest living relative is the cheetah. It's listed as population of least concern. So they're scary. Had great trees behind it beautiful ferns on the ground so it brought me down on the site and the ferns on the ground matched. Join as a $8 per month sustainer and get our brand-new owl umbrella! 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. Patrick Tate: My line being a large predator a cat watch ambush his prey animal that hasn't been. 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. But you can continue the conversation on Facebook or at our Web site and HP Borg. It was in the spring flash kind of early summer and my wife looked at you look at the size of an adult bear and we were up in arms. Good morning guys. Peter Biello: Well I want to ask Patrick about one of these stories a few years ago you had a story about someone who claimed to. Really appreciate it. The great thing about pictures isn't the animal itself it's the background. Peter Biello: Let's talk to Ron and where Ron thanks very much for calling. Author of The last woman in the forest on Saturday July 13th at 7 p.m. at Warner town hall Warner historical dawg. 8 9 2 6 4 7 7. 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. So nowadays we think of this in the Northeast as crazy stuff that people have a mountain lion as a pet. You treat it as if it's a sincere situation. But if you were to get Western dispersing mountain lions just would just sort of expanding into New Hampshire. A lot of times. 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. We'll hear from her periodically through the show. Listeners give us a call if you'd like. Rick van de Poll: Absolutely. Post your sightings and NH photos here! I just don't understand the mechanism for how that would happen. John you're on the air. So so. Now that to me seemed to indicate that they had done the secondary workup that in my opinion proved the existence of probably a disperse or possibly from South Dakota like the one in 2011. Mountain lions can be found throughout Arizona, and data suggests the populations are not only stable, but growing. And I think this is a really interesting story for a couple of reasons one is that it proves what Pat was saying which that basically from New York state where its traces was really picked up on a game camera around Lake George all the way down to Connecticut there was numerous. Caller: Oh hi. I had a resident in New Hampshire tell me a story of a mountain lion in the 1960s where a person who would come summer in New Hampshire and then live in a different part of the country in the winter had a trailer that was housing his mount line. The views expressed in this program are those of the individuals and not those of an HP are its board of trustees or its underwriters. We'll be right back. Patrick Tate: I've had hunters hang deer carcasses forbidding wildlife entries. Patrick Tate: While a juvenile not a juvenile I guess if you want nodes to the base of the tail for juvenile that wouldn't be small at all. There's just one subspecies of North American mountain lion. They used to roam the entire continent, but have become extinct in most US states. I was at the Sentinel as a reporter there for about four years and during that time I probably wrote close to a half dozen stories or so on this topic including a lengthy feature at one point that in which I spoke to several people from around the banana region claimed to have seen mountain lions that at one time or another. 1,470 likes. Maps of Trapping Take by Town 1994 to 2004. 50 feet above the most. Chartered 1973; Member of District 44-H; . Email exchange it an HP fraud org or give us a call 1 800 8 9 2 6 4 7 7. Pat do they typically just move around a lot. The species that once inhabited the Northeast, known as the eastern mountain lion, is now extinct. I looked at the picture and asked me what do you see in the picture and I wrote back. The American Lion The Saber tooth Tiger and this was the one that survived. We've met Fish and Game's BURDEN OF PROOF. HOLDERNESS, N.H. (AP) Two of the known mountain lions in New Hampshire have spent their 15 years in close proximity to humans. Incredible sighting and I called him the fish and game and they immediately sent me to a website to look at all the bobcat pictures. The current estimate is 2,000 - 2,700 throughout Arizona. People were calling the New Hampshire Fish and Game director's office saying why are you dragging your feet on this. Contact the Wildlife Division at (603) 271-2461 or wildlife@wildlife.nh.gov to request an observation report form. Some are included in lists of mountains, such as the Appalachian Mountain Club (AMC) list of the Hundred Highest peaks of New England, or the . And trying to figure out the little pieces to identify him so I bring up the names the differences but the appearances can be confusing for some. Peter Biello: Oh okay. Less successful males roam further. Caller: Hey guys how you doing. We rely on readers like you to support the local, national, and international coverage on this website. Give us a call if you have a question or comments or story about perhaps seeing a mountain lion here in New Hampshire. And they used to be this whole list of the different subspecies of mountain lion and it has since been reduced to just to the North American and the South American. Peter Biello: We at this e-mailed comment from Michael. What kind of animal is that. Many people in New Hampshire have claimed to have seen mountain lions. Do cougars live in New England? But I was riding a mountain bike not far from my house. However the scarring on the trees did not and the angles were off. There have been several sightings of mountain lions in New Hampshire recently. Mountain lions leave a lot of sign. It all used to be based on measurable physical traits color, skull size, paw size, etc but now its based on whether an animal can be shown to be genetically distinct from others. He writes As a farmer I come across many outdoorsman looking to hunt our property had a conversation with one who believed very strongly that we had mountain lions in New Hampshire. BUT THAT SAID, Id love to be proven wrong. 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 give us a call now. There have been several sightings of mountain lions in New Hampshire recently. New Hampshire Public Radio | Peter Biello: I did mention four feet nose to tail would be kind of small for a mountain lion. Me Im willing to believe its possible that there are some out there. By Eric Orff. Peter Biello: When did you allegedly see a mountain lion. Patrick Tate: So it's interesting it's brought up. 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. But but I've also seen it cited the opposite way that look they're very secretive. Course like Sue said you have to see it and it's not always that visible. If you have them email exchange at an HP board or give us a call to tell us your story. What do you think that. Mountain lions remain an enigmatic animal for residents of New Hampshire, with New Hampshire Fish and Game reporting three to five sightings per week. I have one that's more elaborate than that. Patrick Tate: Nice talk to you too. Peter Biello: They make great mascots at least. We'll hear more about the mountain lions impact and the role it plays in the ecosystem. I saw that had this giant the bobcat had this giant sweeping which is John Bobcat don't have big sweeping tails. So I want to start the program with a comment from someone who is not in the studio with us today. 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 Peter B yellow. The big cat has been extinct at least the eastern mountain lion has been extinct here since the mid 80s hundreds. Peter Biello: So a little bit of nostalgia maybe for it for a better world embodied in the mountain lion. I'll send it to you. Caller: Absolutely. So here we have you know a very qualified biologist who who found a print took a plaster cast found a scat send it to a university. They reported seeing the big tail and everything everything. Kyle I think about Rick Tate wants to jump in here. If you believe you have seen a mountain lion and want to report it to NH Fish and Game, please contact the Wildlife Division at (603) 271-2461 or wildlife@wildlife.nh.gov to request an observation report form. And listeners this has been a lively conversation we're sorry we didn't get to all the the e-mailed comments and the phone calls your stories are appreciated even if we didn't get a chance to hear them today. (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. From came from out west they tracked it all the way back to the Black Hills in the Dakotas. 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. nh.gov | privacy policy | accessibility policy Patrick Tate: Okay. Deer Bear Moose Grey Wolf Coyote Foxes Fisher Mountain Lion NH Wildlife History. It's good to talk to you. What's going on. Well let's hear from from Sue Morse again science director for the organization keeping track. Ecosystem Management Consultants of New England, Ask Sam, and recently fielded question about mountain lions, 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, We also hear excerpts from an interview with, Read about the most recent cougar "sightings".