Cougar-control measures protect public
by Director Jeffrey Koenings
Guest Columnist - The Seattle Times,
May 8, 2000

During a typical month, we at the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife receive between 50 and 80 complaints from citizens concerned about cougar activity near their homes or property. Most complaints stem from simple sightings, but some are much more serious.

Last summer, a 4-year-old boy from Kettle Falls was attacked by a cougar while playing in his grandparent's backyard. Thankfully, he survived, but it took 200 stitches to sew up his wounds.

That youngster was the eighth person attacked by a cougar in Washington state during the past decade, with the majority of those attacks occurring in just the past few years. Although no one in our state has actually been killed by a cougar since 1924, the increasing number of attacks by cougars on people and domestic animals in recent years has caused growing concern.

That is why we helped to develop and support two measures approved by the Legislature this year that will put our agency in a better position to address this problem.

One of those measures provides funding for four new "response teams," made up of eight new staff members whose primary responsibility will be to respond to cougar and black bear problems throughout the state. These teams will not only increase our capability to respond quickly to complaints but will also allow us to expand our public-education efforts to help people living or recreating in cougar country avoid a dangerous confrontation with a big cat.

Consistent with our current procedures, our new response teams will work with private dog handlers to track "problem cougars" that pose a threat to public safety and property. Any cougar that attacks a human is euthanized as a matter of agency policy. Those that attack livestock or pets or draw complaints in populated areas are usually tagged, relocated and given a second chance. If they reappear in populated areas or attack a second time, they are euthanized on the assumption that they have overcome their fear of humans and represent a greater threat to the public.

Last year, nine "problem cougars" were euthanized by agency personnel, 14 were killed by those filing complaints and 272 were taken by hunters without the use of hounds. Despite these losses, the state's cougar population is estimated at more than 2,500 animals and growing, indicating that conflicts between people and cougars are likely to become even more acute in developing areas of the state.

To help manage this situation, the Legislature approved a second cougar-control measure this year that allows the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission to authorize private permit-holders to use hounds to hunt for cougars in specific areas where there is a documented threat to public safety.

This new law gives our agency an additional option when our standard approach of responding to cougar incidents on a case-by-case basis does not remedy an ongoing problem that presents a threat to public safety.

I hasten to add, however, that the new law does not authorize a return to the kind of broad-scale, recreational hound-hunting that voters banned in 1996 under Initiative 655. Rather, it amends the initiative to allow the department - with the commission's approval - to use hound hunters to accomplish specific management objectives under tightly defined conditions.

In the first place, the law states that the commission can only authorize private hound-hunting when it "has determined that no other practical alternative to the use of dogs exists." It then requires the commission to adopt specific rules describing the conditions in which dogs may be used, and limits their use to "selected areas within a game-management unit to address a public safety need presented by one or more cougar."

In other words, anyone hoping for a return to the days of wide-scale, pre-1996 hound hunting is bound to be disappointed. However, the new law does give the department an additional option for addressing those situations where cougars presents a chronic threat to public safety.

As a step toward implementing the new law, the department is drafting procedures for consideration by the commission in late summer. To reach the broadest possible agreement on these procedures, we plan to involve hound-hunting groups, animal-rights organizations and homeowners to help determine when, where and how hound hunting should take place, consistent with the new law.

Cougars are truly magnificent animals, native to the Pacific Northwest. At the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, we have a responsibility to protect these big cats, along with our state's other wildlife resources, for future generations.

But protecting human life has to be our first priority, and we are pleased that the Legislature has given us the tools we need to reduce the chance that our citizens will be killed or severely injured in the years ahead.

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