John Harrigan: Fish and Game gives (a bit) on mountain lions
By JOHN HARRIGAN
SOMETIMES IT FEELS like, to quote a famous line from a not-so-famous movie, déjà vu all over again. Someone casts a line about cougars, making side-bets that I'm going to rise to the bait, and I do — every time.
But the headline in the May 1 edition of the New Hampshire Sunday News was a grabber: "Experts: Cougars don't live in NH."
My immediate wish was that the headline had been "Reliable people report cougar sightings, F&G speculates on origins" (of the cats, not the people). But as a veteran headline writer, I know that headlines just can't be that long or diplomatic.
If I'd known that there was going to be a presentation on mountain lions by researcher Bill Betty at the Loon Center in Moultonborough, which drew 95 people, I'd have made it 96. But I thought Sunday News correspondent Larissa Mulkern did a good job summing up discussion on a mysterious, and thus far unresolved, subject.
Bill Betty, who lives in Rhode Island, has chronicled untold sightings over more than 40 years and has even experienced several encounters himself, which makes him a whole lot luckier than I've been. Never having been in the right place at the right time, I've had to settle on reporting "the best of the best" sightings over more than four decades of newspapering, relying on carefully crafted questions that quickly thresh the wheat from the chaff. Mountain lions have been seen by several of my near-neighbors over the years, in broad daylight. The latest occurring two years ago by a very knowledgeable friend just above my back driveway. The cat, he said, cleared the road's two-rod right of way (about 32 feet) in three bounds.
As usual, federal and state wildlife officials acknowledged that cougar reports are common throughout New England, but noted the lack of hard evidence. Fish and Game wildlife biologist Patrick Tate said flatly, "There isn't a cougar population in New Hampshire," citing the lack of credible evidence such as scat, fur or a carcass."It's not that we don't believe them," he said. "What they see might be a mountain lion, and if it is, it's probably an escaped pet." There is extensive trafficking in wildlife, he said, and when cute little pets become hard-to-handle adults, they are often released. To which I'd add that at least Patrick is trying to meet the public halfway on all this. People get really incensed when officialdom suggests that many of them are seeing animals such as bobcats, which are small and have very short tails. "Oh, give me a break," is the general reaction to this.
As I often do during a Q&A session after speaking, Bill asked how many in the room had had a cougar encounter, or knew someone who had. As is always the case with me, 15 or so people raised their hands.
But the headline in the May 1 edition of the New Hampshire Sunday News was a grabber: "Experts: Cougars don't live in NH."
My immediate wish was that the headline had been "Reliable people report cougar sightings, F&G speculates on origins" (of the cats, not the people). But as a veteran headline writer, I know that headlines just can't be that long or diplomatic.
If I'd known that there was going to be a presentation on mountain lions by researcher Bill Betty at the Loon Center in Moultonborough, which drew 95 people, I'd have made it 96. But I thought Sunday News correspondent Larissa Mulkern did a good job summing up discussion on a mysterious, and thus far unresolved, subject.
Bill Betty, who lives in Rhode Island, has chronicled untold sightings over more than 40 years and has even experienced several encounters himself, which makes him a whole lot luckier than I've been. Never having been in the right place at the right time, I've had to settle on reporting "the best of the best" sightings over more than four decades of newspapering, relying on carefully crafted questions that quickly thresh the wheat from the chaff. Mountain lions have been seen by several of my near-neighbors over the years, in broad daylight. The latest occurring two years ago by a very knowledgeable friend just above my back driveway. The cat, he said, cleared the road's two-rod right of way (about 32 feet) in three bounds.
As usual, federal and state wildlife officials acknowledged that cougar reports are common throughout New England, but noted the lack of hard evidence. Fish and Game wildlife biologist Patrick Tate said flatly, "There isn't a cougar population in New Hampshire," citing the lack of credible evidence such as scat, fur or a carcass."It's not that we don't believe them," he said. "What they see might be a mountain lion, and if it is, it's probably an escaped pet." There is extensive trafficking in wildlife, he said, and when cute little pets become hard-to-handle adults, they are often released. To which I'd add that at least Patrick is trying to meet the public halfway on all this. People get really incensed when officialdom suggests that many of them are seeing animals such as bobcats, which are small and have very short tails. "Oh, give me a break," is the general reaction to this.
As I often do during a Q&A session after speaking, Bill asked how many in the room had had a cougar encounter, or knew someone who had. As is always the case with me, 15 or so people raised their hands.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment