Poll: Have you seen a wild puma?

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Have you seen a puma in the wild?

  • No, never seen.

    Votes: 85 58.6%

  • Possibly, brief glimpse but not sure of id.

    Votes: 2 1.4%

  • Yes, seen but not photographed.

    Votes: 42 29.0%

  • Yes, seen and photographed.

    Votes: 16 11.0%
  • Total voters
    145
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I wasn't fast enough with the Nikon. This is a severely cropped iPhone image. Bobcat is one of 4 kinds of Lynx. Doesn't this look more like the Canadian Lynx? They both have a black tipped tail but the ear tips are black too.
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Mal Paso said:
I wasn't fast enough with the Nikon. This is a severely cropped iPhone image. Bobcat is one of 4 kinds of Lynx. Doesn't this look more like the Canadian Lynx? They both have a black tipped tail but the ear tips are black too.
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I have been studying cats for three decades, have photographed thirty species (mostly in zoos), and followed bobcats regularly for a year at a local preserve. I can tell you with 100% certainty that is a bobcat.
 
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I had a brief glimpse at a Florida Panther around 1996 during a birding/photo trip to the everglades. I have seen puma tracks multiple times. I've seen tracks on mudflats in Bosque del Apache, in Rare Avis (Costa Rica), and in mountains that border the Southern CA coast. Like many, I would love to photograph puma (Felis concolor), but I don't want to do it in a way that I endanger the animal and its solitary lifestyle.

bruce
 
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I previously lived on the backside of lookout mountain west of Golden, Colorado. Had a trail camera set up on a productive game trail and would have a lion pass the camera every night shortly after dark for a week, move on, then be back 2-3 weeks later, same pattern. She weened two cubs one year in our backyard. The first night my wife and I loved it, then quickly tired of it nights 2-8 as they cried all night every night til they finally moved on and we had to keep windows open to stay cool. Caught her killing a deer one night, tracked her to her cache, set up the camera there and got a bonanza of feeders (the two cubs- by then young adults, her, coyote, bobcat, golden eagle, red tailed hawk, raccoons) until the carcass was finished.

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No. The last coughar that got lost this way (I am not living in their current range) was shot out of a tree sleeping by the local 'authorities' because s/he was "too comfortable around people." Let me not comment any further. Would love too see one in the wild though.
 
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I lived in Colorado Springs from 2000-2003, and there were human and pet encounters with Mountain Lions in some west-side neighborhoods while we were there. One evening I was out on the Greenspace on my bicycle and caught a fleeting glimpse of what I thought to be a Mountain Lion. It crossed the trail ahead of me and stopped for a moment, but it was fairly far away. My response was to turn my bicycle around and ride home through residential streets. I read too many stories about attacks in Outdoor Life and Field & Stream when I was younger to risk getting closer.
 
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The only time I've seen a mountain lion, cougar, it was from the window of my spare bedroom (my dog came and got me) and he was getting a drink at the little pond I have in from of my house. If I had moved to go get the camera he would have heard me, so I stayed put and just enjoyed it...he was so beautiful. I live in a rural area and they come by on occasion but I have not seen one again.
 
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This past New Years Eve, I spotted a juvenile bald eagle on the hill above my house. Watching it fly down to what was obviously a kill in the snow (there were also a dozen magpies there). The following morning my partner and I were leaving for a trip to meet my children for the holiday several hours away. Before we left, on a whim I ran up to where I could see the kill from a different part of our property. I was a bit surprised when a mountain lion got up off the kill and walked behind some rocks out of sight several yards away. I watched for a bit and then ran down to the van where my long lens was already packed for our trip. I went back up with my camera but the lion never re appeared, and eventually we had to get on the road. When we got home three days later I spent a few early mornings and late evenings staked out looking for the lion to return.
 
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realspeed said:
We don't have them in the UK wild Pumas or bald eagles etc , got a few wld women if that is any help :LOL:
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Of course some people claim there are not only pumas roaming the UK countryside but black leopards as well (why only black?). There has been at least one instance - maybe more - of a released captive puma that roamed briefly before being captured and sent to a zoo. Most other reports are (in my opinion) misidentified animals. The aforementioned puma is now on display at the Inverness Museum.
www.highlifehighland.com

Felicity the Puma - Inverness Museum and Art Gallery

Big Cat captured On 29 Oct 1980 a puma was captured in a cage-trap near Cannich, Glen Affric, by farmer Donald ‘Ted’ Noble of Kerrow Farm. He had set the trap, baited with sheep’s offal, in the hope of capturing firm evidence to back up years of big cat sightings in the area. Ted’s elderly...
www.highlifehighland.com www.highlifehighland.com
 
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While I never saw the cougar, I lived in a rural very small town in Eastern Oregon (think gas station, groceries, liquor store and fast food in one building; an elementary school; and a tavern with saw dust for the floor) that had a momma and two cubs routinely wandering through town. The school had a cougar drill when the cats were roaming. The wildlife biologists said she and her cubs would leave as soon as the cubs fattened up. They did fatten up and one day we realized they had gone.
 
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When I was youngef, I used to often hike into the Goat Rocks Wilderness South of White Pass Highway in Southwest Washington State. Once saw a cat crosssing the large meadow but it was 300+ yards away. We often heard them at night and saw fresh tracks by the meadow lakes where they cam to drink at night. Suburbs may be different as they become habituated but my experience with cougar in the Oregon and Washington wilderness areas is that you are very unlikely to see one close up. Unhabituated cougars seem to avoid humans in the wilderness (So do I)
 
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CoyoteCreationsNW said:
When I was youngef, I used to often hike into the Goat Rocks Wilderness South of White Pass Highway in Southwest Washington State. Once saw a cat crosssing the large meadow but it was 300+ yards away. We often heard them at night and saw fresh tracks by the meadow lakes where they cam to drink at night. Suburbs may be different as they become habituated but my experience with cougar in the Oregon and Washington wilderness areas is that you are very unlikely to see one close up. Unhabituated cougars seem to avoid humans in the wilderness (So do I)
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That is a beautiful place to wander!
 
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Caught this guy a few years ago on my back deck across from our master bedroom on an Arlo camera (screen shot). We‘ve captured a few through the years on our video cameras but always late at night or very early a.m. We live in a rural wooded subdivision in Whitefish Mt., close to the Canadian border. Yet to see one in person unfortunately
 
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Grischer1 said:
Caught this guy a few years ago on my back deck across from our master bedroom on an Arlo camera (screen shot). We‘ve captured a few through the years on our video cameras but always late at night or very early a.m. We live in a rural wooded subdivision in Whitefish Mt., close to the Canadian border. Yet to see one in person unfortunately
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Sorry, not able to download pic.
 
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