Cougars on the edge

Cougars on the edge

Cougars once occupied a range in the Western Hemisphere larger than that of any terrestrial mammal (other than humans) since the Pleistocene (Rabinowitz 2010). Highly adaptable, cougars inhabited deserts, grasslands, tropical rainforests, temperate mountains, and boreal forests. After Europeans settled North America, however, they virtually eliminated eastern cougar populations and dramatically reduced western populations in an effort to protect livestock and valued game species, and also to protect themselves. Later, government funded control and bounty programs, along with widespread unregulated killing of predators in the late 1800s and early 1900s, contributed to further cougar population declines.

Alldredge, M. W. 2011. Cougars on the edge. The Wildlife Professional 5:72–76.

Alldredge, Mathew W.

Cougars

Human-animal relationships

Populations

Boulder, Colorado

5 pages

2011

Article

application/pdf

English

The Wildlife Professional