Puma

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Puma

• Jason Boettger
• Path201

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Mountain lion? Panther? Cougar?

• Yes, yes, yes
• Puma concolor, family Felidae
• More closely related to small cats
• Highly adaptable, carnivorous
• Mostly eats ungulates
• Sometimes eats rodents, insects
• Stalk-and-ambush prdator
• Territorial (up to 760sq.km males)
• Solitary (except mothers)
• Up to 120kg mass
• Live up to 18yrs in the wild
• Have attacked humans, livestock

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Habitat

• Highly varied
• Including forests and deserts
• Prefers dense underbrush
• Historically, across Americas
• Last verified population in eastern
  North America is in Florida
• Shares with other predators
• Bears, wolves

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Endangerment

• Near threatened worldwide (IUCN)
• Declining in some reports, increasing in others
• In America, hunting/human habitat use/livestock
  protection most common causes of decline
• Relegated to mountainous deserts in many areas
• Recently hit by cars as far east as Kansas City
• Few reliable sightings in glades, other parts of
  MO
• Those sighted may not be wild

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(Chilcolithe, Livingston County, N.Cent. MO
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Cougar Conservation

• Target populations in Western states
• 3000 in OR (reached), similar number in CA
• USFWS protected under ESA
• Listed as North American cougar with Florida
  panther
• Cougar identification programs for hunters
  protect females
• Many recent Eastern sightings

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Works Cited

• http//photos.viczhang.com/images/20050923011905_2
  0050926-mountain-lion-2.jpg
• http//animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/site/account
  s/information/Puma_concolor.html
• http//www.desertusa.com/may96/du_mlion.html
• http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ImagePuma_range.png
• http//www.cougarnet.org/missouri12-06.htm