Canadian confirmations IP: 50.204.144.106 Posted on May 31, 2016 at 12:40:10 PM by weather01089
Helen has brought up an interesting point. In Canada, they will confirm a sighting by a wildlife official or one that can appropriately recognize a cougar. Those are called class II confirmations. They DO NOT do this in the US, which of course slants the numbers down considerably. For example, Bill Weber, Yale professor of Forest and the environment studies and NA director of the Wildlife Conservation Society had a cougar cross in front of his car on the Taconic Parkway in 2001. Weber is eminently qualified as a witness and virtually everyone in the private sector accepts this kind of sighting as a Class II sighting report.Why hasn’t ReWilding (Chris and Helen's Organization) ever acknowledged this event or even mentioned it in their web site? We have in our records a reasonable number of wildlife agency employees, professors, and others highly qualified who's observations have been dismissed. Don't feel alone folks, Helen and Chris's organization is an equal opportunity belittler of people's observations. I think its totally unreal that someone with knowledge could mistake a mountain lion for ANYTHING else if they get a good enough view. Helen and Chris's organization feels that cougars need to be "reintroduced" by man. Our position is, why? They are doing it themselves. Their entire organization revolves around this premise. THAT is why they are so dismissive of the facts, and belittle observers here in New England and Canada. People fund them to push that agenda of "rewilding".