cougars in Michigan

[mesquite buckeye]

Update on the Santa Catalina bighorn reintroduction. Game and Fish has been very quiet for the last several months, but they announced last week that there are 16 surviving sheep. They also report 6 lambs born. I'm guessing that the way they worded it that the 6 are part of the 16 and not in addition to. Usual fun statistical lying technique. They also report one surviving ram, which means that all the babies born will have the same father, creating an inbred population.

Apparently they have too much money, as they are talking about bringing another truckload of lion fuel this fall. ;D

[CJennings]

Sometimes reintroductions aren't thought through too well. When they reintroduced marten in Vermont, the fishers got most of them. Oddly enough, the fishers were reintroduced not too may decades before the marten attempt. If they'd reversed the order I think it would have been more successful. Now over 20 years later, the marten are coming in on their own. When caribou were brought back to Maine, brainworm carried by deer got them. If they're going to get a herd of those bighorn established I would suspect they need to do an effective predator control program. Unless they're going to bring in several hundred or thousand animals.