Second Seach: Mountian Lions

We have now begun a new search, one for Mountain Lions. That doesn't mean we have stopped the Ivory-Bill search, it just means we now have two searches. This search began with a camera trap picture of a Moutain Lion near a friends house on Wye Mountain. So my dad and I decided to check it out, because they are said to be extinct in Arkansas.

The Mountain Lion Story in Arkansas goes back a long way in our family. My great grandmother saw a female with 3 cubs near Fayetteville in the early 1970's. She called them "wild Cats." Then in the early 1990's my dad saw a dead Mountain Lion on the side of the road on his way to Fayetteville. He now wishes he stopped to look closer.

All Mountain Lions in Arkansas today are said to be former pets, or decended from former pets of the South American species of Mountian Lion. Of course they're called "pumas" in South America. But the idea of released big cats forming a population seems unlikely, and the camera trap picture that started our search seems to have the weight of a wild cat, not a released pet.

We began our search today with a 30 minute drive through woods and a small town, and then up a mountain. We followed directions from my dad's friend to the exact spot where the camera trap photo was taken. We came to the end of the road on the top of the mountain and hiked in on an ATV trail, looking for tracks as we walked. We then left the path and walked for a while until we found a game trail, then we started to set up our camera trap.

The camera trap we are using is a Birdcam, it didn't really work for the IBWO search because of its motion detection setting, so we repurposed it for this search. We set it about a foot and a half off the ground on a tree, and about 7 feet from the game trail. On the game trail I planted a chicken breast. Then we turned on the camera and headed back out, a quick and painless trip. The chicken will hopefully attract something, if not a Mountain Lion.

And we still have a Camera out in Wattensaw we need to go get...