What would it take for a catamount comeback?

Posted: Jan 05, 2015

By Judy Simpson

WCAX.COM Local Vermont News, Weather and Sports-

JERICHO, Vt. - In the sports world Vermont is known as Catamount Country. But the reality is catamounts, or cougars, have not lived in Vermont since the 1880's. The last catamount was taken  in 1881 and it  is on display at the Vermont Historical Society. However, some wildlife experts think the cat could make a comeback.

This is footage of a cougar in the western United States -- a somewhat common sight. The Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department gets up to 100 cougar sightings reported around the state each year. So far none have been conclusively confirmed, but some wildlife experts believe it is only a matter of time before the catamount  comes back to Vermont.

"In my capacity I am convinced that they are coming and that they will come here in time, it will take some time however," said Susan Morse, the Founder and Science Director of Keeping Track, an organization that has been working for the past 20 years to help people discover, document and conserve key wildlife habitats across North America. She says Vermont's abundant forest cover and large number of prey species, including deer, are perfect cougar habitat. "Porcupines, moose calves, occasional snow shoe hares -- we have it here and there is nothing to stop cougars from re-colonizing the Northeast, except for the fact they have got to get here from source populations in the west and that appears to be the sticking point," Morse said.

But one big cat came very close to visiting Vermont.  He was eventually struck and killed by a car in Milford, Connecticut in 2011. This is the confirmed track the big cat took based on genetic samples that were collected by scientists at sightings. From his birth in South Dakota to Minnesota, Wisconsin, up to Ontario and down through Lake George to Connecticut. Morse says it is not unusual for male cougars to roam, looking for new territory and female cougars. "And the key to security habitat for these animals, the cats especially, is in order for their kittens to be out of harms way they have to sequester them in places where other animals can't readily discover them, or in the case of these cliffs, even access them," Morse said.

She believes relocating some she cats to Vermont would encourage a population base to begin. "The east needs its apex carnivores recovered, and I think a good way to perhaps do that is to bring females in, so that when males do come here like that Connecticut cat, they are perfectly willing to settle down in the habitat. They are not going to stop at any given place in the absence of females and female scent marking  -- that is my belief," Morse said.

That won't happen anytime soon. Such an initiative would take interstate and international cooperation, and Vermont Fish and Wildlife officials say there is currently no such dialogue taking place. But they say they will continue to investigate dozens of calls they get about sightings of the cougar in Vermont -- because -- you never know.

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