Eastern Cougar Extinct, No Longer Needs Protection, Says US FWS

"Eastern cougars that once roamed North America from Canada to South Carolina are extinct and no longer warrant federal Endangered Species Act protections, US wildlife managers have said.

The proposal to remove so-called eastern cougars from the list of endangered and threatened species comes nearly 80 years after the last of those mountain lions was believed to have been trapped and killed in New England, according to the US Fish and Wildlife Service.

Cougars, also known as panthers and pumas, were once the most widely distributed land mammal in the western hemisphere, but extermination campaigns have seen the large wild cats eliminated from roughly two-thirds of their original range, federal wildlife biologists said."

Reuters had the story June 16, 2015.

SEE ALSO:

"Humans Creating Sixth Great Extinction of Animal Species, Say Scientists" (Guardian)