Don't ever tell the Pa, WV, KY & Va DNR’s they are committed to the notion that there is no eastern cougar population left aside for a very small group in Florida.
Yep. I know. My report was not well-received, although I got an excellent view of the animal.
The preconceived opinion in certain quarters is that the eastern mountain lion is extinct, therefore any mountain lions found in the east are of necessity either misidentifications, released pets, or wandering western mountain lions. (They had to come up with some answer when mountain lions began to found dead after being hit by cars.)
My personal view, after doing a little looking at the history, is that a small population of eastern mountain lions centered in West Virginia and western Virginia never died out. There have always been a significant amount of good sightings from that area.
Side note: Mountain lions and wolves are among the most misidentified and overreported (when they aren’t actually there) animals on the North American continent. One clue is to note that it seems that probably close to half of all mountain lion “reports” in the East are of a “black panther”. However, there has never been a verified case of a melanistic mountain lion anywhere on the North American continent.
These bogus reports have lead to problems in trying to sort out the few and rare leigitimate sightings of mountain lions and (pre-1975) red wolves in the East.