Eastern mountain lion: Myth or miracle?

by Paul Farmer, Summer 2004

Rocky Mountain cougars are apparently using riparian pathways such as the Missouri River to disperse and expand eastward into the prairie states and beyond. Because adult male cougars do not tolerate other males within their range, young adult male cougars disperse farther and faster than females. Males are adept at long-distance dispersal. Only one in ten long distance dispersals, however, is female.
Photo by Larry Moats, USFWS.

America’s lion takes many names—mountain lion, puma, cougar, panther, painter, catamount, and more. Scientifically, the species is known as Puma concolor.

A New World critter, the mountain lion once made the entire Americas, save the Arctic, its home. As a large predatory carnivore, it shared the top of the food chain with the wolf. Shy and secretive, but highly adaptable, our biggest cat was as successful in eastern forests as in the Great Plains and western mountains.

Only one other mammal had the cunning and ingenuity to threaten the very survival of the puma in North America: Homo sapiens. Native Americans revered and respected the mountain lion and lived in relative harmony with the cat. However, with the arrival of Europeans in America, everything changed for the puma.

Like the wolf, the charismatic cat was demonized as a killer and intensively hunted. By the early 20th century, it was completely extirpated from the East. At the same time the great eastern forests, which provided cover for the cunning cat, were disappearing under the hand of clear-cut loggers. As its habitat disappeared, so did its main food source—the white-tail deer, which was also hunted nearly to extinction.

The extirpation of the mountain lion in the East was complete before naturalists, officials, and the public ever had a chance to study and come to know the species well. Later in the 20th century, where it survived in the West, it became known as a shy and elusive feline who shunned contact with humans and their enterprises, keeping to the most remote wildernesses.

Now that the mountain lion has been studied, we understand the importance of its ecological role in North America. We also know its essential requirements if it is to fulfill that role. Those requirements include plentiful prey, good stalking topography and concealment opportunities, and noninterference from humans.

Individual pumas need a large home range, and a healthy population depends on genetic diversity. So, if this cat is to be successful over generations, the requirements listed above must apply over several broad, interconnected expanses.

In the 1930s, state and federal agencies intervened in the cat’s descent toward extinction by buying and preserving land to re-grow eastern forests lost to logging, burning, and agriculture. With new hunting restrictions and a return of the forests, the white-tail deer returned as well. Many eastern forests are once again maturing, and deer abound. These measures have restored much of the mountain lion’s former habitat and food sources to the point that it once again has a place, even a need, in the ecological hierarchy of the wildest eastern places. Under the Endangered Species Act, the eastern mountain lion has also been federally protected from hunting since 1972.

The footprint of an adult mountain lion is about 3 to 4-1/4 inches long and wide, with the front paw slightly larger. The footprint of Virginia’s next-largest native cat, the bobcat, is about half the size of the mountain lion’s. Tracks of pumas and other felines can be confused in the field with tracks of various canines. Field signs of puma include tracks, scrapes, scat, covered deer kill, bark shredding, claw marks, and animal remains. Accurate analysis of field sign requires training, experience, and skill. DNA testing of scat, hair, and remains is now available.
Drawing/photo by E. York (Eastern Cougar Foundation).

Although the mountain lion was thought to have disappeared entirely from the East (except south Florida) early in the 20th century, sightings of the cat have continued at a low level across the region through the middle of the century. In the 1960s, the number of sightings began to increase, and increased still more in each succeeding decade. Puma sightings in the East, in fact, have become so common that researchers tend to discount them, there being so many animals that can be confused with the mountain lion when seen by untrained observers or in poor conditions for clear sightings.

Little strong evidence of the mountain lion in the East has surfaced, but in 2000 one was hit and killed by a train in southern Illinois, and a truck recently killed a puma cub in eastern Kentucky. Field studies looking for evidence of mountain lions are ongoing (or recently completed) in the Dakotas, Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan, Missouri, Arkansas, Ohio, West Virginia, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and New Brunswick (Canada).

It is an open question, however, whether breeding populations of mountain lions once again reside in areas of the East that have good lion habitat, such as Shenandoah National Park and its immediate environs. Although most of Rappahannock County is in private ownership, our mountainous terrain, high percentage of forest cover, low road density, low human population density, and large deer population make the county excellent puma habitat.

If the mountain lion is not already here in our county, a pretty good argument can be made that the big cat will be here soon. There is strong evidence that successful populations of western mountain lions are expanding their range by dispersing eastward along riparian corridors into the prairie states and beyond. That expansion of range could eventually extend all the way to Virginia.

The Eastern Cougar Foundation

The Eastern Cougar Foundation is an organization of scientists, environmentalists, and citizens dedicated to the safe return of the mountain lion to the most appropriate parts of its former home range in the eastern United States. The ECF seeks, through field research and public education, the acknowledgement of the important ecological role of the mountain lion in the East. The group is working for increased protection of this cat and for the recovery of its populations in the East, which will improve the genetic diversity of the species and thus its long-term chances for survival. For more on ECF and eastern mountain lions, visit the ECF Web site at www.easterncougar.org.

The second Eastern Cougar Conference was held this April in Morgantown, West Virginia. Much of the information for this article was collected at that conference and from several of the many books referenced on the Eastern Cougar Foundation website.

Released pet mountain lions could be a second source of this species in the wild. Many lions are kept illegally, and as adults they become difficult and dangerous to keep. Another source of wild eastern mountain lions might be from scattered, small remnant populations that never were completely extirpated. The most remote eastern wilderness areas might have hidden the secretive cat throughout the years of its persecution.

So, can the mountain lion really live here in Rappahannock County? That mainly depends upon whether we, the citizenry of the county, can live with the mountain lion.

Over the years, our community and our public officials have increasingly come to appreciate the importance of our natural surroundings, taking steps, individually and jointly, to protect the land we live in and depend upon. To an extent greater than our immediate neighbors, we have used zoning ordinances and our comprehensive plan to limit development and the consequent population explosion that is always so inimical to the natural order that we so appreciate here next to the mountains.

The abundance of bobcat, bear, hawks, rattlesnakes, skunks, and other wild things among us is testimony to the quality of the Rappahannock County environment.

However, it also is testimony to our willingness to tolerate their presence in our midst. What is so special about our county is as much about its citizens’ understanding of, and comfort with, wild things and wild places as it is about the county’s scenic beauty.

If America’s big cat is to have a chance to return and prosper in Rappahannock County, we all need to learn more about this magnificent animal. In addition, our wildlife officials need to begin to think about a wildlife management and protection plan for the mountain lion, before this lion takes up residence here.