“How come no one gets pictures of mountain lions on trail cameras if they’re here?”It’s a question that many ask when questioning the accounts of people who claim to have seen cougars in the wild where the big cats are supposedly not. But as more and more sightings are reported, including recently confirmed accounts in Wisconsin and Nebraska, it’s little surprise that a mountain lion was recently caught on a trail camera in another area they are not known to roam — Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.It’s blurry, but the picture that the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Environment released Monday clearly shows a large cat of some kind and the DNRE says the animal in the photo is “consistent with a cougar.”

Here’s an excerpt from the Detroit Free Press article:

…the last known wild cougar in Michigan was killed near Newberry in 1906.

In
the past two years, five sets of cougar tracks and two photos have been
confirmed in Schoolcraft, Delta, Chippewa, Marquette and Menominee
counties.

In the Winter 2009 issue of Predator Hunting Magazine, wildlife biologist Serge Lariviere asks those claiming that cougars are roaming in the Northeast to prove it. With a confirmed mountain lion sighting in Michigan, which sits on the cusp of the Northeast, they’re getting closer to doing just that.

If it’s legal to hunt mountain lions in your neck of the woods or you’d like to take a trip to somewhere where it is, make sure to pick up a copy of the Fall 2008 issue of Predator Hunting Magazine to read John Waite’s excellent story on calling cougars.