Residents should have been told collared animal was around, some argue
WHITNEY ROYSTER Star-Tribune environmental reporter | Posted: Wednesday, September 26, 2007 12:00 am
JACKSON - A mountain lion on the edge of Jackson has stirred different sentiments about living in a wild place.
A group of women calling itself "Concerned Mothers and Grandmothers of Jackson" sent a letter to Wyoming Game and Fish Director Terry Cleveland, urging him to amend policy to remove any cat "that has become habituated to humans."
The letter was signed by 10 women, including former state Rep. Clarene Law, R-Jackson.
Law said a cougar should be removed or relocated if it has been in someone's yard. Law lives on the east side of Jackson where mountain lions have frequently been seen over the years.
"It's not right not to tell someone like us" that there's a cougar around, she said.
At issue is a female mountain lion that was collared by the nonprofit research group Craighead Beringia South, which is doing research on cougars. The group tracked the 2-year-old female since last fall.
"This situation was a tragedy waiting to happen," the letter said.
Howard Quigley, director of the program, said researchers did know the cat was in and around the Jackson area and informed the Game and Fish Department about the cougar.
"This cat has never caused a problem for all the nine months we've been tracking it," he said.
Mark Gocke, spokesman for Game and Fish, said this was the first the agency knew the animal was in a residential area. But Game and Fish did know when it had ventured close to the edges of town during the previous winter.
He said the agency relocated the cat after it had been seen for several days in the east Jackson neighborhood - the first time it heard of it frequenting the area. He said anytime an animal is in a residential neighborhood and not "just passing through," the department considers that a safety risk.
Gocke also said Game and Fish alerted neighbors to the cougar, and some were "pro-lion" and some were "anti," reflecting a division in the town.
Still, Law and others said in their letter the cat has been seen in northwest Jackson, "near numerous homes, including the home of a set of retired grandparents who watch their very young grandchildren several days a week." It had also been seen up the popular Cache Creek trail - known mountain lion habitat.
The lion was then seen in late August in the front yard of a family with small children, the letter said.
"We can only worriedly wonder how many other times this lion came dangerously close to children and others," and researchers knew it, the letter said.
After the August incident, researchers and Game and Fish relocated the animal to Idaho.
Law said she wrote to Cleveland to make him aware of the situation. The director's office referred the case to the Jackson office.
The women's letter compared Jackson to Boulder, Colo., citing an incident this summer when a boy was attacked by a lion. There, like Jackson, the community was assured there was no danger from the lion, the letter said.
Boulder has lived with mountain lions for years with few incidents.
Still, Law and others want to at least be informed when there's a lion in their neighborhood.
The issue boils down to how to manage wildlife, including predators, in a town situated in the midst and on the edge of wildlife habitat.
Gocke said Game and Fish will decide to relocate or remove animals on a case-by-case basis, looking at what the animals have been doing, what their age and sex are, among other things.
A few years ago, Game and Fish came under fire after killing a mountain lion in the Gros Ventre drainage after it walked through a campground.
Gocke said, too, in a town in the edge of wild habitat like Jackson, "We're popping homes into great wildlife habitat all the time."
According to Quigley: "There are different levels of habituation, as there are different levels of tolerance of large carnivores on the edge of town."
Environmental reporter Whitney Royster can be reached at (307) 734-0260 or at royster@tribcsp.com.