Editor:
So, here we are sitting on one of the last remaining viable populations of the world’s fourth largest cat on the North American continent and what is Oregon doing?
Killing them for recreation. Killing them for profit. All under the pretense of public and livestock safety. Oh, and hunter’s rights.
According to the cougar biologists, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife Cougar Management Plan IS the problem.
Dr. Robert Wielgus, director of the Large Carnivore Conservation Lab at Washington State University, asserted that the ODFW Plan lacks any scientific credibility and the resulting management recommendations contain a number of very serious errors.
Dr. Wielgus recommends ODFW consult with scientists at Oregon State University, University of Oregon, or another research university to design a scientifically credible study.
Combine that with The Journal of Wildlife Management and studies done at WSU that conclude cougar populations in the Pacific Northwest are actually declining (-20 percent/year) because of human intrusion (current human population in Oregon is 3.8 million and growing), and the USDA’s stats on sheep losses – 61 percent die from non-predator means, 39 percent by predators, of which the coyote takes the most followed by the dog.
That’s right! Dogs kill over twice as many sheep as the cougar.
Add the Oregon Health Center data that there has never been a documented attack by a cougar on a person, much less a fatality, in Oregon’s history.
Add that all up and it looks to me like the ODFW is trying to pull the wool over our eyes. ODFW is working for the Oregon Hunters Association now, not the people of Oregon.
If public and livestock safety had been the real concerns of our state government, you’d think they would have done a serious, unimpeachable scientific study with a corresponding plan. They didn’t.
That leaves me to conclude that the ODFW is using the cougar (and all predators) to make money by pandering to the hunter, who will pay $$ to kill; that ODFW is using the livestock rancher and media to achieve this goal.
Hunters (i.e. the Oregon Hunters Association) are lobbying ODFW hard, demanding their killing fix. And the ODFW keeps bending over.
The public safety argument is hypocrisy.
Demanding the death of a cougar for killing a sheep, yet letting murderers, pedophiles, and other violent criminals live. I just read where Linn County has the highest rate of child abuse in the state!
The sheep industry, for a myriad of reasons, has been in steady decline since 1942. It is now a “niche” product.
Maybe it’s time to move on. Pigs, poultry/eggs are more eco-friendly than beef or sheep. Plus, I’ve never heard of anything taking out a pig, have you?
Adding a pack of radio-collared dogs to the hunt is uncalled for and obscene.
Some say the dogs, by treeing the cougar, make it possible for the hunter to have a look-see, then pick and choose his kill… Is it trophy quality? Or is it a nursing female?… and then opt not to kill.
All I’ve got to say to that is, you’re kidding, right? Are you trying to tell me that hunters, killers of innocent life for fun and profit, have morals, compassion, empathy, ethics while out there?
Please… let’s not forget the bison, nor the eastern cougar, nor any creature, for that matter, on land and sea.
Hunting is unwarranted and just flat-out sick behavior.
Diane Daiute
Sweet Home