Minco mountain lion was from the Black Hills
DNA analysis of a mountain lion that was struck and killed by a motorist near Minco show the cat journeyed from the Black Hills of South Dakota, state wildlife officials said Thursday.
The 130-pound male mountain lion was killed by a motorist and found dead along SH 81 north of Minco in November.
The Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation collected tissue from the cat for DNA testing.
“The cat’s DNA shows a very close genetic relationship to wild populations in South Dakota,” said Erik Bartholomew, furbearer biologist for the state Wildlife Department. “We can say with a high level of confidence that this male was born in the Black Hills region. Another clue that this animal is wild is the fact that it had porcupine quills in its stomach.
“Apparently mountain lions consider them to be good eating, or maybe they are easy to catch, but many times western states report mountain lions with porcupine quills in their front legs and digestive tract.”
A small tooth from the mountain lion’s jaw also was tested to determine the age of the cat.
Much like the rings on a tree, the root portion of the tooth has rings that can be used by experts to age the animal.
The Minco mountain lion was at least 3-years-old.
“We have no idea the path he used to get to Oklahoma,” Bartholomew said. “However, with him being killed near the South Canadian (River), he likely was following the river where their primary prey, white-tailed deer, would be in high abundance.”
Male mountain lions will sometimes roam great distances.
“Males tend to have very large home ranges at or over 200 square miles,” Bartholomew said. “The Black Hills is a small island of habitat and many times adult males will get in territorial disputes with young males and the loser leaves in search of new territory.”
Other mountain lions captured or killed in Oklahoma also traveled from the Black Hills, such as a female cat captured in the city limits of Tulsa last year and a male cougar killed by a train in Red Rock in 2004.
A male mountain lion shot in 2010 in the Panhandle by a state Department of Agriculture employee tested positive for genetic ties to populations in eastern Colorado.
Another captured in southeastern Oklahoma by game wardens was genetically tied to populations in the Pine Ridge region of northwest New Mexico.
Anyone who sees a mountain lion in Oklahoma is asked to report the sighting to the Wildlife Department either online at www.wildlifedepartment.com or by calling Bartholomew at (405) 385-1791.
Thank you for joining our conversation on Outdoors. We encourage your discussion but ask that you stay within the bounds of our commenting and posting policy.
Comments
what a beautiful mountain lion, so sad he was hit and killed, i like too tell my story in yexas 3 summers ago i was fishing by myself underneath a bride by elbert,tx on hwy 79, near throckmorton,tx in the summer fishing for catfish there and about 6pm across the brazos river from me came out a big black panther about the same size of this cat, he came down too the creek and got him a drink and look around and see me sitting ther on the bank fishing, i never did move, but this black panther has a eyesite like a eagle and was looking dead straight at me while drinking for the second time before dissapearing into the thickets, just had too tell my story also you never know what you might run up on or something is coming too you…
Jimmy, the South Dakota population has been studied heavily and many were tagged once they were established in the Black Hills. You can find online the details about what percentage of young males and females from that area stayed in the area or left when they reached the age of dispersion. Only recently have many of them been hunted so the population expanded quickly in that first decade and those are the ones that have dispersed throughout the plains including to Oklahoma.
Mr. Harrison, IF you saw a “black panther”, I hope you realize it was NOT a black cougar/puma/panther/painter/catamount/mountain lion. Despite zillions of cougars killed and bred in captivity for eons, there has YET to be a single case of a melanstic individual. If you saw a black “panther”(originally a term used to designate LEOPARDS), it was an escaped/released black leopard or jaguar(which DO have black color phases). This pehenomenon of seeing black panthers is so common, so widespread, it is enough to ALMOST make one think a feral population of released/escaped captives has established in this country, EXCEPT, of course, no one ever seems to see the more genetically dominant, common SPOTTED variety! Curious, isn’t it?……
I’m a lady bow hunter who lives 2 1/2 miles from Ft. Gibson lake near Wagoner. While sitting on stand approximately 4yrs. ago I had a big mountain lion come down a deer trail within 15yd. upwind of me. I didn’t move, it came to an abrupt halt and looked right at me 17ft. up in a tree. I know he didn’t wind me or see me move, he turned around and calmly walked off. They have a keen sense of their surroundings and are real illusive from what I observed.
1) Makes no sense that every lion being found dead in east and midwest over last 2 years is from South Dakota, when the Dakotas lacked a big cat population prior to 1995.
Cougar populations do NOT increase at such a drastic rates in any other North America puma population.
The current cougar population in South Dakota is NOT more than 100! So who is deliberately dumping them in other parts of the east and south, to make it appear the Dakota Lions are traveling widely from the upper Midwest?