I Feel a Good Rant Coming On

It's no secret that I want to work with some pretty big creatures with some pretty ferocious teeth and claws.  Everyone knows that.  Meet me once and you'll know that (and that I'm a die-hard Preds fan) within 3 minutes of knowing me.  These are the things that make me tick.  There are a few of us weirdos out there who love things that most people fear.  We want to work with, protect, and be a voice for things that others are afraid will gnaw on their neck.  Or, as Funkdubie eloquently says (and I shall do part of this phonetically):

"People fear being eht."

I get that.  I do.  But here's the thing: most of the people who fear being eaten (or "eht" if you will) don't go anywhere to even warrant that fear.  I get freaking reports all the time of someone terrified a black panther will steal and eat their kid... Sadly, my NORMAL response to that person is, "Wow... you let your 5-year-old go hiking alone, then?"  I realize my sarcasm doesn't often help, but ignorance fueled hysteria isn't helpful in any realm.  I mean, how much BS rolls around the internet about (recent example) the president ordering drone killing of American citizens for stockpiling.  The logical person should automatically raise an eyebrow, shake their head sadly, and just walk away.  Or maybe we should look for an example about news channels who ALWAYS find the extremist views to argue and broadcast.  We fuel that crap! Know why?  Ratings.  We force stations to obtain funding, the more viewers the better the funding (advertisement/commercial spots), so the more sensational and amazing the news, the better the profit margins.  

It's the same easy-access news and blatant ignorance that hurts apex predators.  Only in this case we've got another couple issues to face.

On top of the ignorance fuel, we have 

• genetic fear (fight or flight, anyone?) for being 'eht', 
• eons of being told about the "big bad wolf" and other 'monsters' out to steal our children and our lives, and 
• (once again) the immediacy combined with a 'lack of legit info with more focus on the hysterics to spur the general public' "news".

If you thought that was my rant, I'm afraid to admit you're mistaken, cuz the rant is coming now.  Ready? 

I want to work with these animals in their environment to learn more about how they interact with and impact the world that we live in (and for anyone shallow enough to think they don't - please don't waste your breath or keystrokes until you've educated yourself on the issues of trophic cascading).  Ok... so that being said, there's a better than average chance that I - being an avid outdoorsman and wanting to work in the wild to boot - could actually die from an interaction with an apex predator.  Let me be very clear in my next sentence: 

IF THAT HAPPENS, IT IS BECAUSE I AM IN THAT ANIMAL'S HOME AND THE ANIMAL IS DOING WHAT IT WAS CREATED TO DO AND WHILE I HOPE IT DOESN'T HAPPEN, I AM OKAY WITH IT.  

It's quite simple.  Animals are going to act like animals.  I go into their realm.  I have a benefit a lot don't wherein I actually go educated on various things AND prepared with - example - bear spray. I also take precautions.  I don't hike alone near dawn or dusk or at night... I ensure my backpack covers my back and the back of my neck.  I (again) carry a can of bear spray that sorta looks like a fire extinguisher.  I learn when to do certain things and when not to.  I use a bear can and put it far enough away for it to be effective.  I don't keep food in my tent or hammock.  At times, I'm armed (though the bear spray is likely going to be a lot better defense).  If I'm not in a national park, I have my very large dog.  I don't hike in absolute silence.  These are VERY simple things that I do to keep both myself and the wildlife safe.

Here's the heart of the rant: 

WHERE IS THE SENSE OF PERSONAL ACCOUNTABILITY IF YOU'RE NOT DOING EVERYTHING YOU CAN TO KEEP YOURSELF SAFE AND YOU BECOME A 'VICTIM'?  This is the biggest rub I have these days.  "mountain biker attacked by cougar" or "hiker mauled  by grizzly".   It's all over the news within moments.  Please don't misunderstand my frustration as a lack of empathy for the person's family - but if you aren't educated on HOW TO BE IN THE OUTDOORS then DON'T BE IN THE FREAKING OUTDOORS.  Not only could YOU get yourself killed, you could get an animal killed for being - ironically - an animal! Is that too much to ask?  I mean, you're not going to go jump out of a plane without a parachute and blame the pilot, are you?  You're not going to go eat a bowl full of hemlock, and then blame the plant for getting violently ill, right?  IGNORANCE IS NOT A DEFENSE.  If you're going into the wild and you're doing everything RIGHT then you knew what you were getting into and - while it may suck - you knew there was a chance of exactly that happening.  

To allude to a recent headline... if I go into a cage with a tiger and I get killed... who is to blame?  I mean, the tiger lacks thumbs - it couldn't work the key or the gate latch... so if I did that and I died, I really hope you all would sit around and tell your friends how I had it coming because I did something I knew better than to do.  Oh - and I wish they wouldn't shoot said tiger to get my body from it - it could be tranq'd...  ((by the way - I know facts come out AFTER things happen... but my rant surrounds the initial "truth" they "report"...which always garners more time than corrections.)) 

These are WILD animals, people.  In a cage or not - they are all inherently still wild.  They are prone to doing what wild animals do.  They don't have eons of domestication bred into them.  They are NOT fuzzy little kitties and puppies and teddy bears. They are predatory mammals that can and will kill you if they feel they need to.  That doesn't mean the average guy or gal is in danger.  That doesn't mean stay out of the woods (unless you're just wanting to leave them to me - which I'm way cool with)... 

...what it means is be smart about the decisions you make, do what you can to protect yourself and the nature you're trying to be a "part of", and realize the very real consequences.  

But - just for the record - you're far more likely to break a leg on a trail than be 'eht'.  Oh wait - that's why you wear boots or good shoes, right?  To keep yourself safe from a potential.  Now take that mentality and increase it.

So, consider that the end of my sermon and I'll STFU the rest of the day.  :)

In Touch with My Wild Side

Today, I got to do something (again) that the majority of humans don't have an opportunity to do.  Interact with big(ger) Cats.

Today was my first day at the zoo.  I won't bore you with the hours of details on enclosure cleaning, promise.  I won't tell you about interacting with the red pandas, prairie dogs, or langurs.  What I will tell you about are the amazing cats that I had an opportunity to interact with today: snow leopards, bobcats, and my beloved cougars.

A photo I took of one of our
Snow Leopards in 2011.

These are really some amazing animals and each are vastly different.  The snow leopards (aka Panthera uncia) were great to be near - and so very close!  The ones here are a family - mother (whose name I can't recall - it was long!), father (Czar), and new daughter (Kenji).  The two females were in the outside enclosure while Czar was in the inside enclosure.  He weighs about 110 pounds (visual estimation only) and was quite mellow.  Of course, to him I'm merely 'the keep'... there to sweep up and spray down his room while he pretended to sleep and not notice me.  He liked to grunt at people, though, which amused me.  Of note, their fur is just as thick and luxurious as it looks; while I see the draw to making them into garments I detest the mere idea of it.  His coat is by far prettier on him.  What I think made him truly adorable to me was his teddy bear.  Yes, his teddy bear.

The bobcats (aka Lynx rufus) were cute - named Gene and Joan (like Gene Simmons and Joan Jett).  It's assumed that they are brother and sister.  Both were prior 'pets' and found released in the city some time ago.  I was distracting them with mice and was enthralled when they kept swatting my hand to get my attention - so very house-cat like!  They are much smaller than the snow leopards, both the size of medium dogs with Gene being a little larger than Joan.  Once again, a great example of why people should NOT assume they should have exotic pets... how irresponsible to force animals to imprint on humans only to them release them to fend for themselves just assuming they will find their wild side.  Amazing little animals!

A photo I took of Coby earlier in 2011.

Of course, that leaves only the cougars (or Puma Concolor - meaning 'cat of one color') to tell you about: Miamya (mee-ah-mie-ah) and Coby.  First off, neither cat has their tail - the most prominent sign on a cougar - each for different reasons.  Coby, who is quite a big boy, lost his in an 'incident' at one time with another animal.  They are also both declawed.  Coby, despite his lack of tail or claws, is still a very impressive cat to behold.  He probably weighs in around 180 lbs and, without his tail, he's probably 4.5-5 feet long.  With his tail, he'd be an easy 6-7' cat.  His head is the perfect shape and his teeth were still incredibly large.  He grunted while I was there but I didn't get to his hear his token cougar growl.  Miamya is quite different.  She was... amazing for different reasons.  Her story is long, but the short version is that she was once a school mascot... but as the school was the bobcats and she is a cougar, they had her tail bobbed and also did a relatively bad job declawing her and filing down her teeth.  It's also suspected that she was once hit by a car in her 'prior life' and she has a pronounced limp.  She's a small cougar, maybe 90-100 lbs at most.  She had an awesome disposition and, due to her perfect little 'meow' and purring, I fell in love with her.  Her sordid history makes the plight of her species all the more prominent in my mind.

I can't wait for my next day!

"Eastern" Cougars?

Eastern cougar

A photo I took of Coby, Puma Concolor

When you say "Eastern cougar" what do people hear? I think they hear
"cougar that reside in the east" rather than identifying this as a specific subspecies of the great cat. This is quite the misnomer. Eastern cougars, which were recently confirmed and declared formally extinct by the USFWS, are a specific subspecies of cougar (puma concolor couguar) rather like the Florida subspecies (puma concolor coryi). Traditionally, it is accepted that the eastern cougar's natural range extended from Canadian provinces west to the Mississippi and south into Tennessee extending to the coast. The Florida panther home range was estimated to range from southern florida up to and bordering the range of the eastern cougar.

The reason this is important is because, while the eastern cougar has been declared extinct, that does not mean that individuals from the current Floria population or the western population haven't begun dispersing to our region. Furthermore, there are estimates ranging from a mere 100 up to 1,000 captive cougars of varied genetic composition in captivity in the eastern united states. Hypothetically, if any of the transient males that have begun dispersing (as the ones we have proof of are all subadult males) were to encounter a released or escaped female... Maybe then we would actually see a population rather than just individuals.

But my questions specifically surround protection. With the eastern cougar being declared extinct, what are the repercussions of shooting a cougar now in this region? With no big game laws around it, does that negate the ability to kill it indiscriminately? For this I seek advice with more knowledge on the subject than I. I asked a hunter friend who I consider a reliable resource and he states that in TN it would have to be a very clear case of self-defense to keep a hunter out of trouble - that there is no season (and therefore you cannot shoot for the sake of shooting) for the cat.

So let's make a drastic flying leap with some data... There was a confirmed western cat in CT and a confirmed Florida cat in mid-Georgia. That's 2 males - lets assume that is half of the transients that made it this far. If we take the middle ground on potential captive cats, that's 500. Of that 500, let's say that 5% are released illegally because they aren't nearly as cuddly when they weight 150 lbs and realize they can eat you. That's 25 individuals. Now let's say that 1% escaped, which is another 5 individuals. Of those, we can estimate that 50% are female. So now we have a wild population of 32 cats in 15 states with 17 males (large range) and 15 females. Looking at just the national forests (c/o Fs.usda.gov), there is a strong stretch of wooded lands from the Chattahootchee in northern GA extending up to northern VA. A very large range hitting exactly where I live... Southeastern TN, northwest GA, southwest NC.

I know from personal knowledge that deer densities of this region are high. So are coyote and black bear densities. So what, then, are the odds that this would be a place of refuge for either dispersed nomads or former captives?