On June 3 Alaska Wildlife Troopers obtained discover {that a} mountain lion had been shot and killed on Wrangell Island, which lies within the southeastern a part of the state close to the border with British Columbia. This wouldn’t be such stunning information apart from the obvious undeniable fact that mountain lions don’t technically reside in Alaska. The massive cats aren’t native to the state, they usually’re hardly ever seen by hunters and different outdoorsmen. Within the state’s 65-year historical past, there have solely been two different recorded situations of mountain lions being killed there.
The June incident remains to be being investigated, based on the Alaska Department of Public Safety, and a spokesperson with the DPS says no additional info is instantly out there. It’s due to this fact unclear who killed the cat and the occasions main as much as its dying. The lion was discovered on U.S. Forest Service land, so the USFS is concerned within the investigation and has the animal in its possession. The company’s Wrangell Ranger District Workplace didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark.
Alaska Division of Fish and Sport public info officer Riley Woodford couldn’t share any additional particulars about the latest incident (he says the company hadn’t been conscious of the incident till Out of doors Life‘s inquired about it). He did, nonetheless, level to some info on the 2 different lions that had been killed inside state traces greater than twenty years in the past. In 1989, a mountain lion was shot close to the town of Wrangell, Woodford explains in an ADFG article. And in 1998, a mountain lion was caught and killed in a wolf trapper’s snare on South Kupreanof Island.
South Kupreanof Island is to the northwest of Wrangell Island however in the identical shut proximity to the mainland. Each are a part of the Alexander Archipelago, a 300-mile stretch of islands in southeastern Alaska.
“We get sporadic studies, possibly two or three a 12 months. Normally there’s one report, then phrase will get out and there’s a rash of sightings that aren’t substantiated,” ADFG wildlife biologist Wealthy Lowell defined in that article. “It’s nearly like Sasquatch.”
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Due to Wrangell Island’s proximity to British Columbia, which is dwelling to an estimated inhabitants of 5,000 to 7,000 mountain lions, it’s seemingly that the mountain lion wandered over from there. It’s fewer than 30 miles because the crow flies from the jap fringe of the island to the worldwide border.
A slender channel separates Wrangell Island from the skinny strip of mainland Alaska bordering B.C., which suggests the lion would have needed to swim to get there. This might sound a limiting issue, however mountain lions are shockingly good swimmers. Vancouver Island, which is separated from the B.C. mainland by a number of straits, is dwelling to a well-established cougar inhabitants.
Many of the mountain lion sightings and kills which can be recorded in B.C. are concentrated within the decrease third of the province properly south of Wrangell Island, which makes the June discovery much more uncommon. In response to the B.C. Wildlife Federation, nonetheless, the species’ vary is considered increasing northward,
