Cougar on the Porch - Analysis

More of this Feature • Text Examples • Images #1, #2 • Images #3, #4

Comments: As you can see from the many versions of the text accompanying these emailed pictures, each specifying a different local community where the big cat was supposedly sighted, some folks weren't content merely to pass the photos along — they had to frighten their neighbors in the process.

The pictures themselves are authentic, in any case. EXIF data embedded in all four images reveals they were shot with a Nikon digital camera on March 10, 2004 (there has been some confusion about the dating of the images, with most sources erroneously claiming they were taken in 2001 or 2002, and at least one other claiming they were taken in 2005). According to a 2007 article in Wild Cat News by the late Dave Hamilton, wildlife biologist for the Missouri Deparment of Conservation, the photos were snapped by Dr. Dave Rodgers of Lander, Wyoming, an area where cougar sightings are not infrequent.

"Other than the small remnant population in southern Florida, cougars have been absent east of the Rockies for nearly a century," Hamilton noted. The limited scientific evidence available suggests there could be a gradual resurgence of cougar populations occurring in some midwestern and eastern states, though biologists insist that will take several more years to confirm.

Meanwhile, ordinary folks from Iowa to Maine keep swearing they've spotted full-grown mountain lions where they're not supposed to exist, egged on by "a hungry news media" that "too often reports unsubstantiated claims as factual," Hamilton wrote. Most such reports involve misidentification of an animal — mistaking bobcats for cougars, for example — or are out-and-out hoaxes perpetrated via the Internet. Time will tell how many of them are true.

Update: On April 14, 2008 a 150-pound cougar was shot and killed by police in the North Side Chicago neighborhood of Roscoe Village. Read more...

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Sources and further reading:

Cougar Hysteria
By Dave Hamilton, Wild Cat News, 2007

Photos of Cougars Create False Scare
Hartford Courant (Connecticut), 5 March 2008

Just Because It's on TV News Doesn't Make It True
NCBI News (Omak, Washington), 15 February 2008

Incorrectly Identified as Wisconsin Cougars
Wisconsin Dept. of Natural Resources, 15 February 2008

Illinois DNR Debunks Cougar Claim
Prairie State Outdoors, 7 February 2008

Reports of Cougars in Illinois Called Fake
Rockford Register Star, 6 February 2008

Phony Pictures Often Look Anything But
Roanoke Times (Virginia), 3 February 2008

Misleading Mountain Lion Photos Circulate on Internet
WJAC-TV News, 14 January 2008

Mountain Lion Photos Spook Many in Maine
Portsmouth Herald, 6 April 2005

Last updated: 04/15/08

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