Cougar Harvest
Donny Martorello, WDFW Bear, Cougar, Furbearer Section Mgr.

There are very few similarities between cougar hunting seasons 10 years ago and cougar seasons today. It is therefore not surprising that there are also significant differences in harvest characteristics between seasons 10 years ago versus today. What may be surprising is how these changes are impacting cougar populations.

Cougar management has been in a state of flux for about 7 years in Washington, largely due to Voter Initiative 655, which banned the use of dogs to hunt cougar in 1996. It was believed that banning the use of dogs would significantly impact cougar hunting success. With this in mind cougar hunting seasons were increased from about 3 to 7 ½ months, bag limits increased from 1 to 2 cougar per year, and the cost of a cougar tag decreased from $24 to $10.

The ban on the use of dogs to hunt cougar also heightened the concerns for public safety and damage. Substitute Senate Bill 5001 was passed in 2000 allowing the limited use of dogs for cougar hunting in specific areas to address public safety issues or pet and livestock depredations.

Figure 1. Cougar harvest trends, 1987-2001, Washington.

Figure 2. Percent female in total harvest

Cougar harvest has steadily increased since dogs were banned by I-655 (Figure 1). The increase is probably most attributed to the overlap between cougar seasons and deer and elk seasons, and the relatively low cost of a cougar transport tag. The changes made in an effort to maintain harvest at levels similar to when dogs were used have been successful. The reduced cougar tag and overlapping seasons made purchasing a cougar tag more attractive for deer and elk hunters, and the sales of cougar licenses increased from less than 1,000 annually prior to I-655 to about 58,000 post I-655. This in turn created a situation where the majority of the harvest is now by deer and elk hunters that harvest a cougar incidentally during their deer or elk hunt.

What’s important about this is that cougar harvest shifted from a selective method (using dogs) to a non-selective method (incidental take). During seasons when dogs were legal, hunters tended to select males and larger, older-aged animals. Without the use of dogs hunters have little or no opportunity to be selective and therefore harvested more females (Figure 2) and a high proportion of younger cougar.

We must now consider cougar seasons in terms of biological impacts to the population and their sustainability in light of public safety and damage. We now harvest more female cougar, more young cougar, and more total cougar – all of which equate to a greater impact to population growth. In short, current harvest levels appear to be reducing cougar populations because juvenile and adult female harvest have increased substantially. This isn’t necessarily alarming, because reducing the cougar population in portions of Washington and maintaining stable populations in other areas is the objective, as stated in the Department’s six-year Game Management Plan.

Achieving cougar population objectives for areas like Okanogan, Ferry, and Stevens counties, where the majority of the cougar are harvested and where public safety concerns and damage complaints are high will be a focus of attention. The next task is deciding how much to reduce the population and, once that level is reached, how to shape cougar seasons in the future to maintain that level. To accomplish this the Department will be activity gathering biological data on cougar populations to guide us in shaping future cougar seasons and management direction. WDFW will seek public input and involvement over the next two years.