This should stop all cougar arguments

[seabast]

So Basically what guys are saying is that....

If a bear, coyote, moose, deer, wolf ect ect ect is seen near civilization / residential areas, chances are those animals are escaped pets?!?!
LOL

Well, when is the last time you heard about a wolf seating in the middle of a parking lot looking at the crowd? Or having a good time between the north and southbound line of the hwy. 11 in the middle of the day?

[GW11]

You have met some Gov Employees right?......Oh I am sure they only posted it as that...once.
I will go with the person I know that read it/was there at the meeting/audit.And if most disagree so be it.Doesn't matter to me in the least if they are tame or wild.Have been hearing this stuff for 40 years and at least now they admit it's a real cougar that people are seeing.Not a mistaken identity or crazy person.And some may still think that which is fine to.

As a matter of fact yes, I do know a few government employees. Some work at the MNR. They would probably get quite a chuckle at the idea of a secret cougar-releasing conspiracy. While I agree with you that cougars are here, either a breeding population or repeated sightings of the same few escapees, I'll never buy into the idea that they were released by the MNR. It's been long established, worldwide for that matter, that introducing (or in this case re-introducing) a predator species to control a prey species just doesn't work the way it's supposed to. The predator generally finds a prey species that is a little easier to catch than the intended species and you end up unintentionally wiping out that species. This is a more common problem when you are trying to control an invasive, non-native species but the idea is the same. It's called biological pest control. What if the released cougars decided that livestock was a far easier target than white-tailed deer?

In a study of cougar sightings in Oregon, a state that 5,000 cougars call home, only seven per cent were proven, in fact, to be of cougars, Rosatte says. And that is in a place with a large and healthy cougar population.

This is kind of going against your own argument. If only 7% of sightings are legitimate in a place where there is a healthy cougar population, where you would think people might actually know what a cougar looks like, what is that saying about cougar sightings in Ontario? You have the uninformed masses from the GTA (no disrespect to those on here from the area who are obviously not part of this group), where most couldn't differentiate a barn cat from a cougar to begin with, vacationing all summer up in the Muskokas and the Haliburton Highlands. Guess where most cougar sightings come from? I would say you would be hard pressed to believe even 1% of the sightings in Ontario based on that Oregon data. People see what they want to see. Same with UFO's, Bigfoot, Loch Ness, you name it.

If you want to be even more generous than JBen's estimate of 100 animals. Let's say 200. You are talking one cougar for every 5000 sq km in Ontario. Considering a cougar's home range is from 150 to about 1200 sq km on the extreme end, how do they ever "hook up" to make more cougars? Yes, I realize that there would be a "central area" where the breeding poplulation is most dense, but I'm not buying into the idea that it's in the cottage capital of Ontario (where most sightings are), otherwise there would be pictures and sightings of juveniles. There could be a wild, breeding population of a hundred or two hundred in a remote corner of NW Ontario, but they are not going to account for the sightings in Huntsville and Cobourg.

The bottom line is, we don't really know. The argument that they are here and are truly wild is much easier to be proven right than wrong. My argument can really only be proven wrong.

[Dobermanhunter]

http://www.thestar.com/news/ontario/...n_ontario.html ......conversation over

[seabast]

http://www.thestar.com/news/ontario/...n_ontario.html ......conversation over

this article is 4 years old and the MNR still doesn't think there is any so the fight is still on!!!!

[Buzz Killington]

You would think with all the trail cams out there, we'd see a lot more...they must be hanging out with Bigfoot

[kickingfrog]

Shocked this didn't end the argument.

[MikePal]

Any idea how many pet cougars are in Ontario? A dozen? a hundred ? more ? Is a cougar something any moron with enough money can own or are there rules?

Yup and Nope.....remember that fiasco with the Ikea Monkey....the was lots of media coverage about the lack of rules to buy, sell and trade exotic pets here in Ontario..ergo why they are often found walking around the burbs.

I stand corrected....cougars fall under the 'endangered species act'..so for them there are a few rules to having in captivity..

Norris did state, "the cougar is listed under the Endangered Species Act so there are some rules and regulations if somebody could keep that and the purpose as to why they would want to keep it."

[kickingfrog]

An alarming percentage of people believe we have been visited by aliens.

[Dobermanhunter]

four years old or not, while the numbers aren't concrete there still hear and unless some one is going to go all across Ontario foot by foot in every direction I see no reason why they couldn't be here, its beyond reasonable doubt to believe they would be here as everywhere surrounding this province has them.

[Larson]

And why would the MNR secretly release cougars? To control the deer? ---Why would they do that, when they could give out more antler less tags, extend the seasons and sell additional deer tags at $30 - $40 a pop? Maybe it was to control the fishers and rattlesnakes that they secretly released. Sorry man…. it doesn't add up. Help me out here.