At the website (link below) you’ll find a news video about the Chicago incident and an enlargement of the trail camera photo taken in western Wisconsin. Some have speculated that the cat in the photo is not a cougar, but the long, dark-tipped tail show that it is. The barring on the inside of the left foreleg indicate that it is young, as are most dispersers that are showing up in the Midwest. The large size of the tracks show that it is a male.
The fact that cougars are dispersing from the Rockies and Black Hills does not mean that these areas are overpopulated with cougars. An adult male cougar defends a territory, which includes three or four females, against other adult and subadult cougars, so most males must be transients. Cougar populations are always sparse because an area can only support a limited number of animals at the very top of the food chain. Dispersing young males play a vital role in preventing inbreeding. Among many mammal species, males routinely leave their family groups. That includes cougars. But in others, such as gorillas, females are the ones that leave.
The Champlin cougar is not likely to stay very long in one place because he is looking for a territory of his own. That territory must include a female. Females rarely disperse as far as males. The only probable wild female documented east of the western portions of Nebraska, South Dakota and North Dakota was a female killed in southeastern South Dakota in 2007.
http://www.examiner.com/x-10429-Chicago-Adventure-Travel-Examiner~y2009m12d24-Mountain-Lion-spotted-in-western-Wisconsin-could-head-to-Chicago
examiner.com – Charleston
Mountain lion spotted in western Wisconsin could head to Chicago
A mountain lion was recorded on a trail camera on Saturday night in Dunn County in western Wisconsin. Wisconsin DNR reported that tracks and a deer kill were found nearby. The last time evidence of a cougar this far east in the Midwest the feline was shot dead in a Chicago neighborhood
This cat could be the same one that was spotted in Stillwater, Minnesota on December 11. Cougar tracks were found by a farmer soon after in Spring Valley 25 miles east and a DNR biologist tracked a cougar on Friday for more than a mile along the Eau Galle River. The next day the camera picked it up on film in Dunn County.
If this is the same cougar it appears the cat is moving east about 5-7 miles a day. It is unclear if the mountain lion will settle somewhere or keep moving. The last time a cougar moved into this territory it kept moving east until it reached its sad demise in Chicago. The DNR does not plan to trap the animal, but would like to tranquilize and then monitor it.
The first confirmed cougar in Wisconsin in a century was detected in January of 2008 in Milton, Wisconsin. On January 4 a motorist observed a cougar running in front of his car. Then, on January 18 a trapper was investigated large tracks that led into an old barn. The trapper spooked the cougar out from the second floor. The lion cut its foot on the subsequent jump and from the blood left the DNR determined it was indeed a mountain lion. This turned out to be the same cougar that ended up shot dead by Chicago policeman in a Roscoe Village neighborhood in northwest Chicago on April 14, 2008.
This mountain lion was found to have the same genetic make-up as the cougars in South Dakota, which makes sense as this is the closest area with a substantial wild mountain lion population. There are over 250 cougars in the Black Hills population. What is most likely happening is that the population in this area has become so successful that it has become saturated. Cougars have a wide range and do not overlap with fellow males, so there are only so many cougars that can stay in one area.
Young males will fan out from their home in search of new territory. A Black Hills cougar study found some animals will travel up to 650 miles in search of new territory. Usually the cougars in this area will migrate to other nearby states that already have cougar populations, but possibly these areas are now becoming dense as well, so this could explain the recent move by some cats into fresh cougar territory in the Midwest.
If the mountain lion continue its 5-7 miles a day pace eastward this means it will make Chicago in about 50 days. I would not like to tussle with a cougar, but somehow the knowledge that there is an animal out there that could kill you makes the outdoors a little more adventurous. The likelihood of this happening is very remote especially with such a large deer population to choose from. This time let us hope this cougar decides to stay and sustain a range in Wisconsin before it moves into an urban area and meets another bad end.