A Michigan man made history on March 6 when he glimpsed a pair of young, wild cats darting around on a snowy road in the state's Upper Peninsula. After one of the pair dashed under his halted vehicle, he and other drivers took a few photos and guessed at the breed. They decided the pair were likely bobcat kittens and didn’t think much more of it.
The kittens turned out to be young, endangered cougar cubs, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (MDNR) confirmed on March 12—and this was the first confirmed sighting of cougar cubs in the Wolverine State in over a century.
Cougars were extirpated in Michigan in the early 1900s. Since 2008, MDNR has confirmed 132 sightings of adult male cougars, a sign that the species might be roaming back into this part of its historic territory, likely from the Dakotas. But without confirmed cub sightings, it’s hard to tell whether a sustainable population is actually resettling, or if it’s just good dispersal territory for wandering adults.
This sighting changes things.
“It’s pretty exciting, considering this could be the first known cougar reproduction in modern times in the western Great Lakes states,” MDNR biologist Brian Roell said in a press release. By “western Great Lakes states,” he’s referring to Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota. “It really shows that we have a unique place in Michigan where someone has a chance to see a wolf, a moose and a cougar in the wild. It’s something that should be celebrated, that we have the habitat to support an elusive animal like this.”
MDNR won't release any further information about the location of the cubs in hopes of protecting them from a curious public. No one has spotted the cubs since March 6, and the mother has yet to be seen, although biologists with MDNR told MLive she couldn’t have been far because cougar cubs are often reliant on their mother through the first two years of life.
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Roell pointed out that cougars are on the list of endangered mammals in Michigan, meaning it’s illegal to hunt or harass them, which includes trying to locate their den. “Those young cougars are very vulnerable right now,” Roell said. “We don’t know where they are or if they’re even alive. Mother Nature can be very cruel.”
