Once again, a new panther thread.

[swamp hunter]

As for the Texas cats, there were 8 females transplanted. That is it. They were of a subspecies closest genetically to the Florida panther. There was always genetic interchange between the Florida panther and the Eastern cougar until the eastern cougar was extinct. You read the old writings from back in the early 20th century about the gladesmen, there just were not many deer there...before the ditching and draining and canals and the diking of the bit O, there just were not many deer....that was not prime habitat, deer can not live off of saw grass, wire grass and the subtropical forbs. The growth of agriculture and drying of much of the everglades out is what led to there being a decent deer population. Keep in mind, this deer population started to explode while there were still plenty of panthers in the area. They were responding to the changing environment. Ecosystems are delicate and the slightest little change has a ripple effect that can at times seem astronomical. We know cats eat deer, we also know from the study of the cats they tested in north Florida that they ate more raccoons, possums and smaller game than they did deer. We know the pythons have pretty much wiped out that population in the everglades, we also know that pythons eat deer....Well, we also know that panthers have a rather large home range, with a males well exceeding 100 square miles. We know that panthers do not allow competing panthers in their home range. We know that panthers kill trespassing panthers. Now here is the clincher. We know you can find more large pythons in one male panther's home range than there are panthers in Florida. And we also know due to a recent publication that one python was found with 3 deer in its stomach.....so, we know that a python can eat a number of south Florida deer a year. What does this tell me....if any one animal is driving the crash in south Florida deer, it is the python....even when it is not eating deer, why? Because it is wiping out all other primary components of the panther's diet. If that is all they were doing....eating all the meso-prey....that would be enough to increase predation on deer...but, they are ALSO eating deer. You want to help the deer? Hunt down and kill every python you can find. There is a small market for python hides...grow that market. You could create a whole new generation of gladesmen who make their living off of python hides. Oh yeah, one last thing.....the higher water, concentrates the deer on the hammocks...which also makes them easier prey for the pythons. The pythons do not have natural predators in South Florida to limit their growth, sure some birds will eat juvenile pythons, and gators will eat a medium sized python...maybe even a large one...but we also know the pythons prey on gators too....you have an environment in South Florida that is in stress due to its alterations over the last 100 or so years. It is in stress due to unregulated urban and suburban sprawl. It is in stress due to lacks of water at time and exclusion of fire at times. It is in stress due to nitrates and phosphates being feed into the system disrupting the aquatic plant diversity. You have a system that is in stress due to invasive plants that out compete the native plants and you are creating monocultures of Australian pines, Brazilian pepper, etc...and they you throw in invasive super predators, the pythons. It is a wonder you have any deer left quiet frankly. They are putting more water into the everglades, more annually than has been there for decades, this is good, but it is also effecting the deer, it is limiting their population, bringing it back to its levels of old....plus all the other problems discussed above. The flood, drought and fire cycle is what is natural for the everglades...it has been altered too much. Maybe it is getting restored little by little, it needs to be, Florida Bay is shot out....That area was home to the panther long before any humans moved there....hopefully it will be home for them for ever....and hopefully they will expand their territory.

Well Said Billcollector...Well said.

 

[swamp hunter]

I recently heard about a DNA test USFW did on our Panthers and I quote..There is no significant difference DNA wise between the Texas Cougars and the SF Panthers.
That would mean they are not some side throwback and undeserving of special considerations....
Haven't heard a peep about this for months . Lot's of Funds at stake here

 

[redneck_billcollector]

Well Said Billcollector...Well said.

Thank you. I am a student of Aldo Leopold and am of a firm belief that all ecosystems are complicated to the extent that it is hard for humans to easily understand them fully. My true passion are the longleaf / wire grass savannas of both the upper and lower coastal plains of the deep South. The interaction of the animals and plants along with the fungi and bacteria are truly astounding. The whole nitrification of the soil along with the interaction of periods of drought, fire and flood just fascinate me with ever single life form having a role to play. It is that way with all ecosystems and our wet soil systems are so important and yet so ignored by everyone. You all have been seeing the effects of mismanagement on a grand scale this year in south Florida. I look at each ecosystem as a complicated tapestry and when you start removing threads randomly and adding threads randomly you are bound to destroy the tapestry and its pattern. Just look no further than our eastern hardwood forests with the removal of the American Chestnut. The crash of deer and all other animals that relied on that one tree to make it through the winter. The fertility of the streams were altered, the whole forest changed in nature with oaks and sweetgums becoming some of the more dominate trees...oaks are good, we all know that, but we all know they are not reliable for mast every year and on bust years we see the effects....chestnuts on the other hand always had bountiful mast crops and they drove the forest cycles. The forests and wetlands of south Florida will never be the same, but we should not just say "oh well" and go on about our business. Predators are always the best indicator of a system, the proverbial canary in the mine, and if you create a healthy ecosystem predators will not have that huge effect on the prey base....at first it always seems that it does, but in reality it does not. When the sportsman is used to an artificially high game base, they naturally do not like predators being reintroduced...but in the long term it helps, just look at the changes in Yellowstone and the natural return of the beaver since the wolves have returned. A true sportsman realizes this. I hunt to be part of the environment, the success of my hunts are never measured by how much game I harvest...it is measured by the whole experience....the birds and animals I see...the flowers....the sounds and yes, it would be so much more if in fact I saw a panther track a bear track or a wolf track...just knowing I am not the only creature looking for prey.

 

[Last Minute]

So, since cougars from Texas were brought to Florida to help increase the Florida panther population, then why aren't deer from Texas also brought over to increase the herd of Key deer?
Also, hogs are classified a 'non-native' species as they were introduced. Ditto pythons. So then, how aren't these cross bred Texas/Florida cats also considered non-native?
The time has come for the panthers to be taken off of the Endangered Species list, and all public funding needs to cease immediately. The day is coming in which we won't see anymore fauna in our woods, all in the name of saving the panther. Then what happens, the panther dies of starvation....

 

[Big7]

I read that same article. Lets hope those Cougars and Pythons don't eventually move northward into Ga some day.

That would be bad. Just look at the so called "reintroduction" of the coyote has done to fawn size animals as well as calves. Not to mention quail, rabbit and other GAME animals.

I happen to be one person who wants panthers here.

Not me. Ask the people out west that have to hire hunters with dogs to get rid of them.

There is a TV show about that. Mountain Men.. I think.

We don't need any invasive species here. 2, 4 legged finned or snakes or nothing else!

 

[Nicodemus]

Thank you. I am a student of Aldo Leopold and am of a firm belief that all ecosystems are complicated to the extent that it is hard for humans to easily understand them fully. My true passion are the longleaf / wire grass savannas of both the upper and lower coastal plains of the deep South. The interaction of the animals and plants along with the fungi and bacteria are truly astounding. The whole nitrification of the soil along with the interaction of periods of drought, fire and flood just fascinate me with ever single life form having a role to play. It is that way with all ecosystems and our wet soil systems are so important and yet so ignored by everyone. You all have been seeing the effects of mismanagement on a grand scale this year in south Florida. I look at each ecosystem as a complicated tapestry and when you start removing threads randomly and adding threads randomly you are bound to destroy the tapestry and its pattern. Just look no further than our eastern hardwood forests with the removal of the American Chestnut. The crash of deer and all other animals that relied on that one tree to make it through the winter. The fertility of the streams were altered, the whole forest changed in nature with oaks and sweetgums becoming some of the more dominate trees...oaks are good, we all know that, but we all know they are not reliable for mast every year and on bust years we see the effects....chestnuts on the other hand always had bountiful mast crops and they drove the forest cycles. The forests and wetlands of south Florida will never be the same, but we should not just say "oh well" and go on about our business. Predators are always the best indicator of a system, the proverbial canary in the mine, and if you create a healthy ecosystem predators will not have that huge effect on the prey base....at first it always seems that it does, but in reality it does not. When the sportsman is used to an artificially high game base, they naturally do not like predators being reintroduced...but in the long term it helps, just look at the changes in Yellowstone and the natural return of the beaver since the wolves have returned. A true sportsman realizes this. I hunt to be part of the environment, the success of my hunts are never measured by how much game I harvest...it is measured by the whole experience....the birds and animals I see...the flowers....the sounds and yes, it would be so much more if in fact I saw a panther track a bear track or a wolf track...just knowing I am not the only creature looking for prey.

Yep. Well spoken, Brother Jay.

 

[redneck_billcollector]

That would be bad. Just look at the so called "reintroduction" of the coyote has done to fawn size animals as well as calves. Not to mention quail, rabbit and other GAME animals.



Not me. Ask the people out west that have to hire hunters with dogs to get rid of them.

There is a TV show about that. Mountain Men.. I think.

We don't need any invasive species here. 2, 4 legged finned or snakes or nothing else!

We did not "reintroduce" the coyote in GA. It came here on its own...if you consider it a coyote. As for its impact on deer, I wish they would take more. We have too many deer as it is. As for quail...interesting fact. The Albany Quail Project originally started by Auburn and now under the guidance of Tall Timbers would disagree with you. It is the most extensive study on wild quail ever done....anywhere, with thousands of quail with radio transmitters and hundreds of nest cams, their conclusion is that our "coyotes" have a positive impact on quail populations. Coons and possums are the number one and number two culprits on raiding nests, up to 80% of the nests being destroyed in some areas of the study by those two animals. The study found that the higher the number of "Coyotes" and bobcats the more successful hatches, why you ask, the nominal predation on birds by these two animals were outweighed by their preying upon the coons and possums and with more coyotes and cats, you had more quail. Back to the deer. You must not have been deer hunting very long in GA. When I started deer hunting, there were no coyotes here...but, there were also very few deer. If you saw a doe, which you couldn't shoot by the way, it was the talk of the deer camp, and I am talking about in SOWEGA, which is the best area to hunt deer now. The deer population grew, with these wild canines whose populations grew at the same time, quiet frankly, beyond the carrying capacity. If you ever see a browse line in the woods, there are way too many deer. I have lots of wild canines on the land I own, and I have lots of deer. The problem comes with objects that concentrate deer, feeders, food plots, etc. These concentrate deer predators. I have seen our deer season go from ...not being able to harvest deer in certain counties, and a one buck limit in the others....to now where the limits are more than the majority of hunters can take in a year. At one time or other every state in the union had bounties on cougars...that is not the case any more. I have hunted them....I was not paid to do so, I paid a lot to do so, they are really good eating (many mountain men of old preferred its meat to all others...it is just like veal) . He does it on the show because it is legal and I imagine he likes the meat. As for houndsmen being hired to hunt them, yeah, just as they are in Fla. it is to put collars on them and study them. I know a few houndsmen that make some good money doing it, the guide I hired did that during the off season. Panthers would not be an invasive species here, they were here originally, GA had a bounty on them. They were extirpated, so if they show back up, they are a natural part of our environment. The whole state of GA is considered part of the historic and natural range of the Florida subspecies of Felis concolor. By definition, invasive species is something that did not occur naturally or evolve in a certain local. Panthers were here before we were and they were here until the last century.....on a regular basis, not the rare young male looking for females. Interesting you would say 2 legs in talking about invasive species....all white people would fall in that category, and arguably so would all natives, they did not evolve here.

 

[redneck_billcollector]

So, since cougars from Texas were brought to Florida to help increase the Florida panther population, then why aren't deer from Texas also brought over to increase the herd of Key deer?
Also, hogs are classified a 'non-native' species as they were introduced. Ditto pythons. So then, how aren't these cross bred Texas/Florida cats also considered non-native?
The time has come for the panthers to be taken off of the Endangered Species list, and all public funding needs to cease immediately. The day is coming in which we won't see anymore fauna in our woods, all in the name of saving the panther. Then what happens, the panther dies of starvation....

You do that, and every little piece of property in SWFLA that is not owned by the state will be subdivided, with the exception of some of the older ranches. Also a decent chunk of the land owned by the state and the feds down there that is not being subdivided is there only for the panthers. The texas cougars are closest genetically with the eastern cougar....which always had a genetic interchange with the Fla. panther. Strange though. I understand that on the ranches in the area there is still a decent deer population. I only see this on another forum I am on with a number of deer hunters who hunt ranches in panther areas. I also see some decent deer harvested on them. But then again, the ranches are on the only decent deer habitat down there and are burned on a regular basis for stimulating grass growth, and this also stimulates forbs and legume growth. The ranches tend to be more xeric in nature which is better for the deer.....

 

[redneck_billcollector]

After double checking on the Seminole subspecies of deer a few moments ago, I think I am going to book a hunt on a ranch south of Ft. Meyers with an outfitter for next year. No high fence, and some really nice Seminole whitetails harvested this year. I actually think it is a couple of ranches that this outfitter leases hunting rights on. They even say if you are lucky you can see a panther. They have a decent harvest rate. Combo deer hunting and canal tarpon fly fishing trip in the near future...

 

[Big7]

That would make YOU RONG. redneck_billcollector

1st paragraph
Among the non-native wildlife found throughout the southeast, coyotes are unique in their ability to rapidly acclimate to a variety of habitats. With the extirpation of the red wolf in the last century across Georgia, the coyote (Canis latrans) has been able to fill a once occupied void and now can be found statewide.

Last paragraph under NUISANCE
second sentence:
Trapping and/or hunting are additional solutions against nuisance coyotes. Because coyotes are a non-native species in Georgia.
That would either make YOU or GDNR wrong.

I’ll go with GDNR.

And I have been hunting Georgia over 40 years.
Pretty sure I know the drill.

Read more here:
http://www.georgiawildlife.com/node/1391

No, we don’t need big cats either.

Bout’ half-way down the page. Note the date.

Although coyote populations are increasing in Georgia, and studies show they kill and eat newborn fawns each spring, Whitney said studies are still under way to get a more precise picture of their impact on whitetail deer numbers.

More on that here.
http://chronicle.augusta.com/news/metro/2011-01-05/hunters-offer-solutions-states-deer-decline
They are NOTHING compared to what big cats would be.

If you need more, maybe you can disagree with UGA.
http://athenaeum.libs.uga.edu/xmlui/bitstream/handle/10724/31060/WDS No 10 - Coyote.pdf;sequence=1

STATUS........ on down the page a little.
In Georgia, coyotes are non-native and there is no closed season for harvest. Coyotes can be
captured with foothold traps and live traps. Hunting can also be effective using distress calls to lure in
the animal. Their fur is still valued and coyotes may be seasonally hunted for commercial pelts.

They are NOTHING compared to what big cats would be.

One way to find out for sure if Cats make it this far north
would be for one to step in my cross hairs. Then we would know.

 

[Nicodemus]

What we have sure doesn`t fit the description of a coyote. It does fit the description of a red wolf though. To a T.

7, would you shoot one of those panthers? And if so, why?

 

[Big7]

What we have sure doesn`t fit the description of a coyote. It does fit the description of a red wolf though. To a T.

7, would you shoot one of those panthers? And if so, why?

Not around Waycross where they are suposed to be, unless there was a season.
Not just for fun anyway. If I need it to eat (as in survival) or was threatened by one probably would.

I'm sure I don't want them around here and would if
I wouldnt go to prison or something like that. Small Florida would be iffy.
Big 150# Western would get the hit for sure.

I don't kill for fun. Just to eat or protection of game animals, smaller livestock, pets, chillens, etc..

AND they will do a BUNCH of damage in Ga., where they have no predator except maybe man.

I'm not a fair weather friend either. Same reason(s) I don't like bluebacks, flatheads and land-locked linesides.. Except they are good to eat and I won't put one back.

 

[Nicodemus]

What type damage do you think they would do?

In a healthy ecosystem I feel that they would fit in just as they did for thousands of years, along with the red wolf and bear.

 

[Big7]

What type damage do you think they would do?

In a healthy ecosystem I feel that they would fit in just as they did for thousands of years, along with the red wolf and bear.

You would be right back then.

Man has taken a lot of creature habitat and domesticated
many animals for food.

I understand predation, taking out the weak and diseased
and all that.
It's a crowded field now and I just don't think introduction of top
of the chian predators would help man, domesticated animals
(as in food) or other game animals. They would be forced to hunt not
only the weak and diseased, but the healthy too.

I, like I'm thinking you feel the same, was born 100 or so years to late. Maybe longer than that.

 

[redneck_billcollector]

1st paragraph
Among the non-native wildlife found throughout the southeast, coyotes are unique in their ability to rapidly acclimate to a variety of habitats. With the extirpation of the red wolf in the last century across Georgia, the coyote (Canis latrans) has been able to fill a once occupied void and now can be found statewide.

Last paragraph under NUISANCE
second sentence:
Trapping and/or hunting are additional solutions against nuisance coyotes. Because coyotes are a non-native species in Georgia.
That would either make YOU or GDNR wrong.

I’ll go with GDNR.

And I have been hunting Georgia over 40 years.
Pretty sure I know the drill.

Read more here:
http://www.georgiawildlife.com/node/1391

No, we don’t need big cats either.

Bout’ half-way down the page. Note the date.

Although coyote populations are increasing in Georgia, and studies show they kill and eat newborn fawns each spring, Whitney said studies are still under way to get a more precise picture of their impact on whitetail deer numbers.

More on that here.
http://chronicle.augusta.com/news/metro/2011-01-05/hunters-offer-solutions-states-deer-decline
They are NOTHING compared to what big cats would be.

If you need more, maybe you can disagree with UGA.
http://athenaeum.libs.uga.edu/xmlui/bitstream/handle/10724/31060/WDS No 10 - Coyote.pdf;sequence=1

STATUS........ on down the page a little.
In Georgia, coyotes are non-native and there is no closed season for harvest. Coyotes can be
captured with foothold traps and live traps. Hunting can also be effective using distress calls to lure in
the animal. Their fur is still valued and coyotes may be seasonally hunted for commercial pelts.

They are NOTHING compared to what big cats would be.

One way to find out for sure if Cats make it this far north
would be for one to step in my cross hairs. Then we would know.

I never said they were not non-native if they are coyotes....I said we did not "reintroduce" them and that they came here on their own. However, there is a growing number of biologist and naturalist that are disagreeing on whether they are coyotes, and the dna studies are bearing that out. There are a number of threads on here with regards to that issue. As for doing a number on the deer, I would not mind seeing the statewide population at about 1/4 of what it is now. Sure they are impacting the population, the population needs to be impacted, drastically. I have a question, how do you feel about the expanding population of Black Bears in GA? We know they prey heavily on fawns and in areas where they are, they can take a large percentage of the population. Today I drove from Albany GA, the Newton GA, (one county over) then up to Leesburg Ga (one county north of Albany) I saw 5 deer dead on the side of the road and signs of numerous other deer / car collisions ie large blood patches on the highway. That is traveling roughly 40 miles through rural southwest GA. This is not counting the two on a one mile stretch of Philema Road right outside of Albany. When I was trapping coyotes for pay back in the late 70s I would drive those same roads daily and would maybe see 1 or 2 deer a year and yet I was trapping numerous coyotes or as I call them brush wolves a day, year round. I do know this, small black wolf like animals were present here in Bartram's day ( late 18th century) its scientific name was lupus niger and I do know that is a common color phase, growing more common amongst our wild canines, and you will never find that out west where the coyotes roam, I trapped western coyotes too. You will also see that wolf dna is in every sample tested from the southeast, where domestic dog dna is much less. Why is this interesting to me? Red wolves are genetically gray wolves and coyotes that cross bred at the end of the last ice age. Also our coyotes will form packs, they never do that out west. Red wolves do. UF (all with decent percentages of wolf dna and very little dog dna and none in most of the samples) did an interesting dna study, basically the only one on southern coyotes, and the link is posted in a couple of the threads in this forum and others on this board. Those of us who have trapped "coyotes" and were around when they first started showing up....know that these animals are not the same as the western coyote...which is where these are supposedly from. As for a panther stepping in your crosshairs, a gentleman did that in west GA a few years back. We know what happened to him. That my friend is a felony and your days of hunting would be over. A couple of test cats were killed by GA hunters in the 90s, they also got in some rather deep trouble. Back to the canines, I never said they did not take deer, they not only take fawns but grown deer who are weak...I said I wish they would take more.

 

[redneck_billcollector]

You would be right back then.

Man has taken a lot of creature habitat and domesticated
many animals for food.

I understand predation, taking out the weak and diseased
and all that.
It's a crowded field now and I just don't think introduction of top
of the chian predators would help man, domesticated animals
(as in food) or other game animals. They would be forced to hunt not
only the weak and diseased, but the healthy too.

I, like I'm thinking you feel the same, was born 100 or so years to late. Maybe longer than that.

I agree about the 100 years thing...except I would rather have been here 250 years ago, in the southeast, not to speak for Nic, but I know he likes the long hunter period too. The debate on predators is an ongoing one, I see their benefits having hunted out west before the wolves, and since the wolves...and seeing Yellowstone before wolves and since wolves. The elk are not as docile as they used to be. You have to work a little harder...but so what, hearing wolves howl while you are sitting around the fire is more than worth it. Read Aldo Leopold, a life long hunter and he used to be a government trapper, he became the apex predator's number one champion and started the movement. He is one of the many fathers of modern wildlife conservation. He will open your eyes if you are willing ......I have traveled pretty much all over the western hemisphere hunting and fishing....I know, when there are numerous apex predators...it is just that much more fun for me. Those mountains in the background of my Avatar are teaming with mountain lions and the occasional jaguar, there are also plenty of deer, sheep and peccaries. Those are some of my favorite hills to explore. As for Florida, 150 years ago the largest percentage of bio-mass would have been cracker cows, the wild cattle of Florida that help create the American cowboy...yes, Florida beat them all with that amerian classic. Estimates are that the herds of wild cows were in the 100s of thousands if not over a million at one time. Little know fact, Florida was the last free range state in the lower 48....

 

[Nicodemus]

I saw 5 different ones this week, and one was black with full coat that was prime. That was one purty critter.


100 years ain`t far enough back for me. Early 1700s would be more like it.

 

[redneck_billcollector]

Not around Waycross where they are suposed to be, unless there was a season.
Not just for fun anyway. If I need it to eat (as in survival) or was threatened by one probably would.

I'm sure I don't want them around here and would if
I wouldnt go to prison or something like that. Small Florida would be iffy.
Big 150# Western would get the hit for sure.

I don't kill for fun. Just to eat or protection of game animals, smaller livestock, pets, chillens, etc..

AND they will do a BUNCH of damage in Ga., where they have no predator except maybe man.

I'm not a fair weather friend either. Same reason(s) I don't like bluebacks, flatheads and land-locked linesides.. Except they are good to eat and I won't put one back.

The Waycross area is an area that has been designated as panther habitat and one of the best areas to establish another population of them in the recovery plan. A few of the test cats took up residence in that area in the 90s. Two were killed, one in a snare and another one shot with a bow if my memory serves me. Your bears over there put a hurting on the fawn population, and it is not one of the better areas in the state for growing deer, the soil is not too productive and the browse in pine plantations just is not that good. Beautiful country though and would be much more productive if it was open longleaf / slash and wiregrass savannas of days gone by. They had a goodly number of red wolves that way with the black ones having white chest patches on the females being rather common back in the late 18th century...at least according to William Bartram who explored a goodly bit over there. If you see a "black coyote" and harvest it, donate the carcass for a dna test. I will pay for the test, you might be surprised at what you find out. I do not lay steel anymore, simply because there is no firm market for the fur, back in the day though..but dna tests were not an option then. I trapped some land down around Fargo for St. Joe if I recall correctly in the late 70s. Picked up a few "black yotes". P.S. Nic, is that the long tined deer you got the other week in your avatar?

 

[Capt Quirk]

Come to think of it, I saw one in Washington County Florida a few years ago but the Game and Fish Commission biologist said I was mistaken. There wasn't any in the panhandle.

I'm in Washington Cty, and I saw a cougar/puma/whatever you want to call it, and it was only a couple miles away from our property. Not a panther, black or otherwise. And, like you, I was told it wasn't possible by Fish and Game. When we were moving up here from Florida almost 8 years ago, I saw on lying dead on the side of I-95, at about 11 miles this side of the state line.

 

[redneck_billcollector]

I'm in Washington Cty, and I saw a cougar/puma/whatever you want to call it, and it was only a couple miles away from our property. Not a panther, black or otherwise. And, like you, I was told it wasn't possible by Fish and Game. When we were moving up here from Florida almost 8 years ago, I saw on lying dead on the side of I-95, at about 11 miles this side of the state line.

Panther is the name most commonly used when talking about the cougar that is native to Florida....and it is never black. That is even what the state government and the Feds refer to it as, "Florida Panther".