News

Published 3/1/2018 in Arizona Public Media by Beth Surdut

Author and wildlife illustrator Beth Surdut focuses on mountain lions, and how sometimes, the hunter can become the hunted.

Published 11/25/17 by Tim Steller on tucson.com

We’re likely to hash out this debate next year in Arizona, as the Humane Society backs a proposed ballot initiative to ban all hunting of wild cats, including mountain lions and bobcats. But for now, it’s taking place in the African context, with a Tucson twist.

Published 10/16/17 in News 4 Tucson by Sam Salzwedel

TUCSON – An organization has launched a campaign to ban hunting wild cats.

A ballot initiative would end bobcat and mountain lion hunting in Arizona. Nancy Young Wright is volunteering on the campaign.

Published 10/15/17 in tucson.com by Douglas Kreutz

An estimate from March says as many as 85 bighorns may be in the Catalinas, but that number has not been confirmed.

Bighorn sheep appear to be enduring in the Catalina Mountains today — four years after efforts began to re-establish a herd in the range, state wildlife officials say.

Published 10/15/17 in NPR Morning Edition by Nell Greenfieldboyce

Supposedly solitary pumas actually hang out with their fellow big cats quite often, frequently coming together and hissing and snarling before settling down to share a delicious elk carcass.

Carcasses are consumed by many mammals, birds, study finds.

Published 10/11/17 in Jackson Hole News & Guide by Mike Koshmrl

An incredible diversity of wildlife — from chickadees to grizzly bears — make use of cougar-killed carcasses that are distributed around the mountains and valleys of Jackson Hole.

Published 10/11/17 in The New York Times by Douglas Quenua 

Pumas have long had a reputation as loners, studiously marking their territory, hunting individually and tolerating one another only when it’s time to mate.

But the animals — also known as mountain lions, cougars or panthers — may be more social than previously thought, according to a new study published Wednesday in the journal Science Advances.

Published 7/13/17 in The Washington Post by Jason Bittel

Somewhere in Yellowstone National Park, a wildcat is walking around with a little extra swagger in its step today. That’s because a new study estimates the value of one specific bobcat there at a whopping $308,105 a year.

How does just one aloof floof generate more cash than the median American home is worth? Not by trading stocks or reinventing the juicer, of course, but by doing what bobcats do best — prowling about the boulders in pursuit of small creatures to devour.

Published 3/29/17 in The Los Angeles Times by Amina Khan

Why do some humans engage in expensive ventures to hunt lions, elephants and other big-game species that often are endangered or otherwise threatened?

The cost, according to a trio of scientists, is exactly the point: These pricey big-game hunts are meant to show off men’s high social status to competitors and potential mates.

Published 9/20/16 in The Washington Post by Karin Brulliard

Ecologist Stephen Kellert and colleagues carried out what became a keystone survey of Americans’ attitudes toward animals. Researchers recently conducted the survey again, and they found that while dogs and cats maintained their rock-solid top spots in U.S. hearts, creatures that were long hated have risen in the ranks. According to the results, published this month in the journal Biological Conservation, Americans today feel “significantly more positive” about bats, sharks, vultures, wolves and coyotes than they did in 1978.