Cougars in Mississippi?

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Wildone39

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Dec 17, 2007
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(( thread resurrected at post # 65 on 4-23-2011 ))

I live in Mississippi and have all of my life. My family has been on the same land since before the Civil War and one day while i was driving my mother to the store i saw a Cougar or panther or Moutain lion crossing the road. It was not a bobcat, i see those all the time. This thing was huge and was light brown with a long tail. Now i have checked with the state and they say there is no Cougars in this state but i know what i saw. I watched him sniff on the edge of the road and then cross it very slowly. I pulled over and sat there and saw this. Does or can anyone tell me if they have seen the same thing in this state? Alot of people claim to hear panthers scream and besides me there have been others to claim to see them. It bothers me that the state denies this.
 
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When a state means there is no ...(insert name here) they mean that there is non confirmed sightins (sightings backed up by concrete evidence) When I was a boy growing up in rurual NYS I new a girl who was thrown from her horse when a mnt lion darted across the path in fromt of her...but still there are "no mnt lions in nys"
 
Oh ok, well me and about 10 others can confirm a sighting on a cougar in our area. You would think they would know about these cats here. Thanks for your reply RescueRiley
 
Up here in the Catskills there have been an increasing number of long tail cat sightings. Some of local hunters believe that they have been covertly introduced to control our large coyote population. I personally feel that it is just a matter of the cats following the food chain.
 
It took TN forever to admit they had a coyote problem. If coyotes can spread that much, why can't cougars?

Charlie
 
NJ has introduced them near Ft Dix to handle deer overpopulation. WVA has done the same thing .VT has done DNA sat tests confirming they are there. PA and NY continue to deny they exist !! Yes there are people who imagine things but when you hear sighting from experienced hunters who have seen them out west you know they are in the east too !!
 
Well it's been about 7-8 years since I've been to Mississippi and about 15 years since I lived there. My father saw Cougar/Puma there as far back as late 70s and I found scat and tracks around Saucier into the mid 80s. It was about 1992 (If I remember correctly) when a good sized one took a deer we downed outside of Poplarville.
 
I think cougars are a lot more prolific than people think...They have the ability to lay low if they want...
 
Although the sightings are on the increase I have never heard of any incident regarding a large cat. They seem to stay in their own enviroment, although all those posters for missing dogs and cats on the telephone poles have me wondering if at times they get closer than we know.
 
Do mountain lions take house cats? I thought they would have been to small to bother with? If this seems like a stupid question I don't live anywhere near mountain lions :P
 
At night when man sleeps, the rest of the animal kingdom reigns. Cougar cubs have been found in backyards in our area. The mom leaves them while she prowls the surrounding area for food (dogs/cats) and picks them up on her way back into the bush. Deer walk down our street just before the dawn. Quail, turkey, coons and bobcats all live within the city limits and even though the fish and game people deny they exist in our area, black bears show up every now and then.

Fish and Game also say that there are no longer any of the California Giant Black Wolverines. But I saw one, called F&G and pointed out it's tracks to them and they still denied that they exist. My opinion is that they know they are still around and are protecting them. It might be the same with the cougar in Mississippi.
 
xinel,From what I have seen on National Geographic channel, they will even go after small rodents if nothing else is available.
 
longbow, the black bear are so prevalent in my area that Encon actually put up a large billboard discouraging people from feeding the bears. A few residents have been warned with citations for feeding them. It's nice to see them in the corn fields but I for one don't want them in my yard.
 
Dave if you son't mind me asking where abouts are you..,in NY? I was recently hiking in Sterling forest and heard some buzz about mnt lions in the surronding areas.
 
RR, I'm farther up, in the Saugerties area. Most of my woods time is spent in the Hunter, Tannersville, Windom part of the Catskills. Although I am technicaly a flat lander, my heart is in those mountains.
 
I live in East Kentucky & they say there are no big cats here either but I've been in the woods for many years, I know my tracks & I was coyote hunting w/ my brother a couple of weeks ago when we came across some cougar tracks:eek: Also a while back there was a young cougar hit by a car on the road about an hour from here (Floyd county), The dept. of F&W made the final word on it & said it was a young cougar ! So yes I believe you;)
 
About 8 years ago my sister and I found a cougar track in the Pearl River Wildlife Management Area. That is on the Louisiana side of the Pearl River, but I can't see why a cougar would not be on the Mississippi side too.

It is funny how people want to deny the existence of cougars. Ten years ago I found a cougar track while getting ready for bowhunting at Camp Bullis in Texas near San Antonio. I reported it to the hunting authorities and they told me that it was not a cougar's without ever going to look at it. :confused: I just shrugged my shoulders knowing that it was a cougar track.

About three years later the TV news were reporting that the homeowners of an adjacent subdivision were having troubles with a cougar that was eating their pets. The cougar had been sighted several times in the mornings and that it appeared to be living in... :eek:Camp Bullis.

When I went hunting there again I was warned (by the same guys who had denied the existence earlier) that a cougar was in the area and to be careful. I graciously declined to say, "I told you so!":)
 
Many of the present day Florida cougars, are descendents of a Central American (as I recall) cats that escaped from an exhibit many years ago. Could be they got introduced some how on Miss.
 
Well guys for what its worth, I know there here. I dont mind them being here at all. I love wildlife but now that i have seen one, ill be cautious when entering the woods. Ill have my Colt 357 on my hip just in case. Oh and we have plenty of Coyotes here in MS. too. You can here them everynight if i walk out on my porch. I live in the country though.
 
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