The Head of the COUGAR REWILDING FOUNDATION, Chris Spatz, along with like-minded Conservation Groups urging the USFW Service to recognize that all Pumas in North America are the same species and that there is no basis for delisting a so-called Eastern Puma when all genetic evidence points to all Pumas in North Armerica being the same creature ............Rather, the USFW Service should immediately create a Recovery and Rewilding/Re-introduction Plan(under the umbrellea of the Endangered Species Act) for the Puma across the significant and viable habitat that exists east of the Mississippi River(sections of New England and the Appalachian Spine down through Georgia)

Press release with embedded comment letter to the USFWS.

7/28/2016

Groups Urge USFWS to

 Protect and Recover 

Cougars Coast to Coast

Agency claims eastern cougar
 "subspecies"
 is extinct, but DNA evidence says all 
cougars
 in North America are the same subspecies

MEDIA CONTACTS:

Christopher Spatz, Cougar Rewilding Foundation,
 845-658-2233
, spatzcat61@gmail.com
Lynn Cullens, Mountain Lion Foundation,
916-606-1610
, LCullens@mountainlion.org
Greg Costello, Wildlands Network, 206-260-1177,
 greg@wildlandsnetwrok.org

Photos available for media use


When the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS)
 declared i
n 2011 that the eastern cougar was

 extinct, the irony reverberated throughout the
 wildlife-
protection movement. In a letter to USFWS

 this week, conservation organizations commented
 that the
 problem with such a decision is that no scientific
 evidence
 exists that the cougars which once ranged the
 East are
 different than other 

cougars throughout North America.

"The USFWS cannot declare extinct a cougar
subspecies our
 best science now understands never

 existed," says Cougar Rewilding Foundation
 president,
Christopher Spatz. "The USFWS needs to 

develop a federal recovery plan for the entire
historic range
 of the North American cougar

 including the eastern U.S."

Currently, the puma species native to the western
 hemisphere
 taxonomically is named Puma

 concolor (also known as cougar, mountain lion, and
 panther).
 Listed as an endangered species in 1973, Puma
 concolor
 couguar, the eastern cougar, was just one of 32
subspecies
 described in 1946. However, genetic research in
 the 1990s
determined there were just six subspecies, including 

the one that is widely distributed across North
 America, Puma
 concolor cougar.


The 2011 USFWS review acknowledges that the
1946 taxonomy

of the eastern cougar is flawed.

 Modern research cannot distinguish between the
thousands of
cougars living throughout the

 western U.S. and the rare historic specimens tested
 east of the
 Mississippi River. Cougar biologists

 now generally agree there is a single North American
 subspecies.

"This is a simple case of a broadly-dispersed North
 American
 subspecies moving to recover its

 historic range east of the prairie states," said Lynn
 Cullens of
 the Mountain Lion Foundation.

"The big cats face no fewer threats than when they
 were
 originally listed. Federal action should

 include, not remove, protections for animals seeking
 territory
 within the former range."

The main point made by cougar advocates is that
cougars need
 federal protection under the 

Endangered Species Act (ESA) across the entire
range from which
 they were exterminated. 

Recolonization has been attempted by cougars
dispersing from
 prairie states into the Midwest for a generation,
 with rare
 evidence of the cats roaming as far afield as the
 Michigan
Upper Peninsula, Kentucky and even Connecticut.

"The Midwest has been a cougar graveyard for
 25 years,"
said Spatz, "Females and wild kittens

 have not been documented east of the Missour
i River."

Adding to the complexity of the puma recovery
 effort is the
fact that the endangered panther

 of Florida - currently listed under the ESA as a
subspecies -
 shares the primary genetic makeup 

of the rest of the U.S. population.

"As the lone surviving cougar population in the
 East," said
 Cullens, "the panther's federal recovery

 plan, including reintroductions, is critical to
 recovery
 across the southeastern U.S., and the panther
should
remain fully protected by future USFWS decisions."

A recent scientific paper, "An Ecosystem Service
 of Cougars,"
 gave a strong boost to the argument for a new
 federal
 recovery plan for cougars when it pointed out
 that deer
in the U.S. (the cat's main prey) cause 1.2
million deer-
vehicle collisions annually, incurring $1.66
 billion in
damages, 29,000

 injuries, and over 200 deaths.

"Pumas are one of the most important
 ecosystem
regulators we have," notes Greg Costello of

 Wildlands Network. "When people see the
 economic
 and safety value of big carnivores doing
 their

 natural work, we'll all benefit."


"We can't rely on a shooting gallery of state
laws that
 encourage everything from unenforced

 protections to 'kill on sight' to no policy at
 all," notes
 Cullens. "State laws are real obstacles, sure
 as bullets,
 and cougars don't see borders."

The groups believe that the federal law and
spirit that
restored bald eagles and peregrine falcons

 to the East should apply to every cougar on
 a journey
to reclaim its historic range.

###

2,730 individuals and these 73 

organizations signed the letter:

Advocates for Snake Preservation
American Ecological Research Institute
Animal Legal Defense Fund
Answers for Animals, LLC
Anthony's ALL Service
Arc of Appalachia Preserve System
AZ Public Media
Battle Creek Alliance & Defiance Canyon Raptor
 Rescue
Beartracker Wildlife Tracking Services
Canis Lupus 101
Chrissie's Fund
Connecticut Audubon Society
Cougar Rewilding Foundation
Eastern Coyote/Coywolf Research
Endangered Habitats League
Environmental Defenders of McHenry County
Every Sig Counts
Friends of the Wisconsin Wolf & Wildlife
Ghost Cat Habitat
Great Old Broads for Wilderness-Phoenix Broadband
International Wildlife Bond
Julian Mountain Lion Project
Justice for Wolves
Keeping Track
Kentucky Coalition for Animal Protection, Inc
Kentucky Heartwood
Laguna Greenbelt, Inc.
Los Alamos Study Group
Mountain Lion Foundation
Mountains Restoration Trust
National Wolfwatcher Coalition
Nevada Wildlife Alliance
Next 2 the Tracks
Oregon Tiger Sanctuary
Pasadena Audubon Society
Placer Nature Center
Predator Defense
Primero Conservation
Project Bobcat
Project Coyote
Public Interest Coalition
Raptors Are The Solution
Rare species conservatory foundation
RESTORE: The North Woods
Safe Haven Wildlife Sanctuary
San Bernardino Valley Audubon Society
Save Our Sky Blue Waters
Sea Shepherd Conservation Society
Sequoia Forestkeeper
Sonoma County Wildlife Rescue
South Dakota Lion Activism
Southern California Desert Video Astronomers
Southern Colorado Environmental Council
Southwest Environmental Center
Symba Wildlife Conservation
Tennessee Heartwood
The Animal Interfaith Alliance
The PathWalker Group
The Rewilding Institute
The Wildcat Sanctuary
Topanga Creek Watershed Committee
TrailSafe Nevada
Warrior for the Wolf
Western Wildlife Conservancy
Wild Oasis
Wild Virginia
WildCat Ridge Sanctuary
WildEarth Guardians
WildFutures
Wildlands Network
Wildlife Research Institute
Wolves of Douglas County Wisconsin
Wyoming Untrapped