Tag: cougar

Rarely seen Yellowstone wildcats appear boldly on ridge

Footage shows the normally elusive mountain lions traversing a snow-covered ridge as if out for a Sunday stroll.

A guide in Yellowstone National Park last week captured footage of rarely seen cougars traversing a snow-covered ridge as if out for a Sunday stroll.

MacNeil Lyons of Yellowstone Insight told FTW Outdoors that he was leading a photography tour with a guest from the U.K., who was “extremely excited” to observe cougars for the first time.

Understandable, considering that most visitors to Yellowstone do not see cougars, or mountain lions. Although the park is home to perhaps a few dozen of the large wildcats, they’re famously stealthy and elusive.

Lyons shared the accompanying footage via Instagram, writing:

“High in elevation, between craggy peaks these two sauntered on the ridge line with a backlit ‘bluebird’ sky! As the lions went out of view from one vantage point, I read the landscape and moved a few miles down the road to try a different vantage point.

RELATED: Yellowstone bison stampede toward snow coach in thrilling encounter

“Our luck continued as we picked them up as one sat and peered over the edge of large snow cornices. We had our time with them for at least 20 minutes.”

Lyons told FTW Outdoors that he captured the footage in the northern range from more than a mile away, with an iPhone attached to a Swarovski spotting scope.

He said the cougars might be the same pair – perhaps a courting pair, or a mom with a subadult offspring – that was spotted recently on a ridge hunting mountain goats.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DFZPuDixW3Q/

According to the park, cougars are native to the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem but were nearly eradicated throughout the Lower 48 states during predator-removal campaigns in the early 1900s.

They survived in the West largely because of their preference for remote, rugged habitat, and their elusive nature.

Lyons, who has documented an astonishing 37 cougar sightings in 25 years of living in Montana, expressed concern for the future of the park and surrounding region in light of new or proposed laws that could jeopardize wildlife.

He concluded his Instagram post:

“We need these Wild Places. But more importantly the entire 4-legged, feathered and scaled community needs this wild space. Pay attention to new state & federal laws that lessen the protection of our Public Lands.

“Times are changing and seemingly not to the benefit of those without a voice… the animal community. Be their voice for protection and ethical stewardship of these wild spaces.

“Thank you to all that are keeping up the Good Fight.”

Florida panther sneaks up on opossum, but outcome is a surprise

Footage reveals that top predators such as endangered Florida panthers aren’t always savage beasts.

Florida panthers prey on an assortment of mammals, including opossums. But for one seemingly oblivious opossum recently, it must have been its lucky night.

The accompanying footage, credited to Dick Brewer and shared by Matt Devitt of WINK Weather, shows a panther walking up behind an opossum, seemingly out of pure curiosity.

ALSO: Yellowstone cougars ‘saunter’ across ridge in rare sighting; video

Although both animals bare their teeth, the encounter features a surprise ending, revealing that top predators aren’t always savage beasts.

Top comment on Facebook: “This is the Florida we need to be saving.”

https://www.instagram.com/p/DFv9XvJxFPx/

Endangered Florida panthers are protected by state and federal law, numbering slightly more than 200 individuals. Their top prey items are deer and wild hogs.

Rare footage shows Yellowstone cougar stalking mountain goats

Extremely rare footage shows the cougar, or mountain lion, attempting to gain an edge on several goats perched on a cliff.

An ecotour company that specializes in wolf-sighting expeditions in Yellowstone National Park has shared extremely rare footage showing a cougar stalking mountain goats on a snowy slope.

“Look carefully above the mountain goats to see a cougar stalking them along the mountainside,” Yellowstone Wolf Tracker stated Thursday via Instagram. “Our Winter Wolf Watch was lucky enough to get a rare glimpse of this big cat at work but the mountain goats survived in the end by perching on a tall and narrow cliff, leaving no room for the cougar to attack.”

The accompanying footage is grainy but viewers can see the goats holding positions as the cougar, or mountain lion, ranges back and forth before exiting the frame.

https://www.instagram.com/p/DE50LfgRzcS/

Cougar sightings are rare in Yellowstone, with an estimated population of only 34 to 42 animals residing in the park’s vast northern range. The stealthy cats prefer rugged terrain and prey primarily on mule deer and elk, plus smaller mammals, notably marmots.

Mountain goats reside in the park but are not native to the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem

Can you spot the hiding cougar ready to attack?

A mountain lion was well hidden as it stalked an elk in Rio Mora National Wildlife Refuge.

Editor’s Note: A version of this post was first published on July 7, 2020.

A hard-to-spot mountain lion patiently waits for the right moment to attack an elk feeding in a gully at the Rio Mora National Wildlife Refuge in New Mexico in a photo posted by the refuge.

The elk was unaware of the predator’s presence, and at first glance one can understand why. The cougar is very well hidden. So much so, even many viewing the image on the refuge Facebook page admitted not being able to spot the mountain lion. (The answer is revealed below.)

The photo was captured by a trail camera as part of a monitoring project looking at the success of restoring arroyos at the refuge, located about 150 miles northeast of Albuquerque.

The Rio Mora National Wildlife Refuge asked visitors to “share this and find out how many of your friends can actually spot this elusive predator.”

Also on FTW Outdoors: Can you spot the hiding rattlesnake? The homeowner’s dog did

“That was tougher than I thought it was going to be,” one commenter wrote.

“Oh wow! It took me a long time, but I finally found it. Such amazing camouflage!” another wrote.

“Congrats to the person who was reviewing these images! I would have moved right on past!!” said yet another.

Many found the mountain lion difficult to spot even when expanding the photo.

Other comments:

“I’d be dead since I still don’t see it.”

“I can’t find it even when I expand the size of the picture.”

“Found it but took about five minutes.”

Mountain lions are stealthy creatures, and typically they will see you before you see them. They hunt at night and often are lying in wait for prey or silently stalking it before pouncing from behind and delivering a lethal bite to the spinal cord, according to The National Wildlife Federation.

For those who missed it, we circled the hiding mountain lion.

So, what happened to the elk?

“We are not sure,” the Rio Mora National Wildlife Refuge wrote on Facebook. “The elk moved on and the puma moved out into the open and towards where the elk was. We are not sure what finally happened.”

Photo courtesy of the Rio Mora National Wildlife Refuge.

Missouri deer hunter charged after shooting cougar from tree stand

Mountain lions are protected in Missouri and the animal was walking away from the elevated stand when it was shot.

A Missouri deer hunter who shot and killed a mountain lion as it passed beneath his tree stand last month has been charged with a misdemeanor.

According to KY3 News, Joseph Licklider of Desloge, Mo., informed the Iron County Sheriff’s Department on Nov. 16 that he had shot the mountain lion, or cougar, while in the tree stand with his partner.

Missouri does not have an established cougar population, but a handful of sightings are reported each year. The protected animals can only be killed in self-defense or to protect pets or livestock.

The cougar that Licklider killed was wearing research tags from the Nebraska Game & Parks Commission, and walking away from the elevated stand when it was shot.

The charge for illegally killing protected wildlife was leveled after an investigation determined that Licklider’s action was unjustified. He’s scheduled to appear in court in February 2025.

Watch: Rescued mountain lion cub snuggles with ‘perfect plushy’

The tiny cougar, being cared for by the Oakland Zoo, is shown taking comfort in the companionship of its super-soft stuffed dog.

The Oakland Zoo has shared adorable footage of its newly acquired mountain lion cub snuggling with its favorite toy and comfort item – a plushy stuffed dog.

“The perfect plushy just hits different!” the zoo exclaimed via social media.

Footage shows Briar, who was rescued in early August after being found without a mom in El Dorado County, is shown cozying up to and napping briefly upon the stuffy’s shoulders.

https://www.instagram.com/p/DALzHKIPf_d/

Briar was 4 or 5 weeks old when he was rescued – a search failed to turn up its mom – and will be cared for by the Oakland Zoo until a forever home can be found.

One of the top comments: “Thank you, for everything you’ve done for Briar. I still think of Mama.”

Cougar kills family cat, returns 9 hours later in haunting visit

Video shows the mountain lion peering through a glass door during the day and night, perhaps eyeing the 5-year-old inside as prey.

Editor’s note: An earlier version of this story included a graphic video. It has been removed.

A mountain lion killed a family cat, peered through a glass door in the back of the house and then, in a haunting visit, returned nine hours later when it banged its head against the same glass door.

The frightening encounter occurred last month outside Calgary, Alberta, around noon just after Jessica Low had made lunch for her 5-year-old daughter, as reported by OkotoksOnline. The girl had spotted something in the backyard.

“Within about a minute of sitting her down, she cried out to me that, ‘[Oreo] is dead,’” Low told OkotoksOnline. “I shot up off the couch to see what she was talking about and there was a cougar coming right up to the window with our dead cat in its mouth.”

The cougar pawed at the window and hissed, perhaps eyeing the girl as prey.

Low captured video of the scary ordeal and it was posted on the natureismetal Instagram account.

A call to the Alberta Fish and Wildlife Enforcement prompted officers to go to the house and look around, but they were unable to locate the mountain lion. They did remove Oreo’s body, hoping it would deter the cougar from returning.

But it did return around 9 p.m., and this time Low’s older daughter was the first to see it.

“It came back to the window and was banging its head up against the glass and kind of stared at me while I came towards it, and as I got closer it turned around and ran off,” Low told OkotoksOnline. “Fish and Wildlife said that they think it was kind of testing the glass, which is why it was bumping its head against the glass, which is pretty scary.”

Fish and Wildlife personnel returned to the house but again failed to locate the animal. They returned the next day and set traps in hopes of capturing the cougar. It is not known if they eventually caught the mountain lion.

Related: Man calmly videos cougar walking past him; ‘I had bear spray ready’

But less than two weeks later, 10 miles from the attack outside Low’s home, a Foothills resident came face-to-face with a cougar, which attacked his dog. Jakob Strasser returned home and heard a commotion at this front gate just before 8 p.m., according to the Calgary Herald.

“I ran up to it, had nothing in my hands, and I just screamed at the cougar,” he told the Herald.

The cougar dropped the small dog, which sustained injuries but survived. It remains unknown whether it was the same attacking cougar.

“We are next to the Ann & Sandy Cross Conservation Area, so we know that they [predators] are potentially around here, but we’ve been out here for about two and a half years, we have a camera on our door, and we’ve never seen anything at night, let alone during the day,” Low told OkotoksOnline.

“I would just not in a million years think that a cougar would come out in the middle of the day.”

She told the Herald, “Cougars around here are just getting bolder.”

Rare sight as cougar hauls deer across Colorado ‘backyard’

Colorado Parks and Wildlife explained that the mountain lion was “on its way to cache (or store) its food.”

A Colorado resident has captured extraordinary footage showing a mountain lion hauling its deer kill across a meadow in Larimer County.

“Our Backyard. Glacier View Meadows, Livermore, CO,” Shari Fortson described Friday via X.

Mountain lions, or cougars, commonly prey on deer. But the cats are most active at dawn and dusk so predation events are rarely witnessed.

In the footage, the mountain lion pauses occasionally as if to rest or obtain a better grip on the carcass.

Fortson’s video was shared by the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Department, which remarked: “This is a rare look at a mountain lion on its way to cache (or store) its food. The lion will return to their cache over the next few days to continue eating.”

The most popular comment beneath Fortson’s post was in reference to the cougar: “Looks more like his backyard.”

Glacier View Meadows is a rural paradise near the Arapaho National Forest along the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains.

–Generic cougar image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Extremely rare cougar sighting documented in Missouri

Missouri biologists say the recent sighting of a mountain lion in Shannon County was only the 117th known sighting in the state since 1994.

Biologists in Missouri have confirmed that a mountain lion did, in fact, kill an elk in Shannon County on Sept. 12.

The confirmation is newsworthy because there are no known breeding populations of mountain lions in Missouri.

In fact, the latest sighting – confirmed via trail cameras positioned near the elk carcass – was only the 117th known cougar sighting in the state since 1994.

The Missouri Department of Conservation explained Friday that all sightings likely involved animals that were passing through the state.

The predation of an adult elk, the MDC added, was not considered abnormal.

“Mountain lions are natural predators to elk, and this scenario is nothing to be concerned about,” biologist Nate Bowersock stated in a news release. “Here in Missouri, we have an abundant of natural foods for mountain lions. While we do get questions regarding livestock, there has never been a confirmed instance of a mountain lion killing livestock in Missouri.”

While mountain lions inhabited Missouri at the time of European settlement, “the last known historical specimen was killed in the Bootheel area in 1927.”

The nearest states in which mountain lions do exist include Wyoming, Colorado, North and South Dakota, and Texas.

Biologists collected genetic samples from the site of the Sept. 12 sighting in the hope of learning more about the animal.

–Mountain lion image atop this post is generic

Cougar pursues coyote past trail camera, audio reveals likely result

Recent trail-cam footage showing a mountain lion hunting a coyote is reminiscent of a similar but more dramatic scene captured last fall.

On Monday we featured trail-cam footage showing a mountain lion’s successful nighttime hunt in the Southern California wilderness.

The mountain lion, or cougar, was shown following a coyote past the camera and returning minutes later with its kill. The footage revealed a predator-prey interaction that plays out routinely on trails when most people are in their beds.

It’s also reminiscent of a similar but more dramatic scene also captured via trail-cam in eastern Orange County. (See video below.)

In Nathalie Orozco’s footage, captured last fall, the coyote is shown trotting down a trail and a stealthy mountain lion sensing opportunity. The ambush occurs in the darkness beyond the camera’s infrared light, but audio reveals the likely result.

Mark Girardeau, who featured the footage on Orange County Outdoors, stated:

“Just before entering the frame, the mountain lion noticed the coyote and went into action to secure his next meal. Notice how the mountain lion pounces quietly rather than sprinting.”

A scouting mission the next day turned up coyote fur but no carcass. Girardeau, who theorized that the cougar had hauled its kill off-trail, commented:

“Our guess is that the mountain lion was successful based on other nearby cameras which showed him hanging out in the area for the entire night afterwards.”