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There's no one, I mean no one, as smart as a DNR biologist. Just ask 'em, they'll tell ya.

Oh, I don't know. Mr. Armchair Joe Citizen is pretty damn smart too.

And Mr. Common Sense is a sharp cookie also.

So, there is a lot of competition for top dog on the IQ ladder. You should ask'em. They hang out over on the Campfire all the time.

I was indoctrinated right along beside them. Sometimes Mr. Common Sense was hard to find.

Come on Brent. The guy might bs from time to time but to pretty much be told " you didn't see that, it was something else, just so they could push their own agenda, sure makes one sound like a pompus ass. That is the type of crap that puts the dnr in poor standing with the citizens.

I'm curious to hear about the agenda?

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Tom,
I hear ya. Really I do. But I've seen folks sent out after an escaped Komodo Dragon that was "as big as my golden retriever"


It came back in a Nike shoe box - size 10 iguana.

I've seen black bears reported in Lawrence Kansas (black lab)

And the list goes on and on and on. How many alligators in the NYC sewers?

So you can imagine that the always hated and wrong DNR might get a little tired of everyone's claims. Meanwhile, Wisconsin and Minnesota DO NOT have a lion population. And no one lists lions as residents of the state.

You might just put yourself in their shoes once in a while. I have to work with the guys and they get pretty darn tired of being shot up in public by people running around making claims of this than and everything else, all the while claiming that the DNR has some sort of secret and subversive "agenda".

You know, those guys really are on our side. We still pay their freight and make their livelihoods possible. Why does everyone here hate them so? Everyone of them that I know are pro-hunting. even the nongame biologists. The vast majority are hunters - rabid hunters. But damn hunters hate them. I have no idea why the continue to do their jobs when they get this kind of treatment every single day.

Sorry for the rant, but really think about it before your condemn them all out of hand like that.

Without them, your hunting wouldn't even be as good as it was back in the 70s. You don't want go there again.

We need a few cool mornings to straighten everybodies heads out.



Hey i'm reporting great news from Dusty. His visit to the mayo went very well. Dusty is certain that all the prayers and well wishes here are to thank, and he asked me to let everybody know that.

Me too.

This reminds me of a story I heard from an attendee who was at a meeting in Thief River Falls, MN a few years ago. The meeting was presided over by MN DNR who were hosting a public meeting. One of the attendees inquired if there was a hunting season on cougars/mountain lions in MN. The reply was the official "There are no Mountain Lions/ Cougars in MN". The questioner then asked if it would be okay to shoot the big long tailed cats and babies that were denned along a ditch on a local gravel road outside of town. The response was a prompt and emphatic "NO, we have been watching them".

I'm not talking about all cases brent, just this one. There were pictures, video, and actual folks that know, seeing this cougar.

These aren't people in NYC looking down their sewers. These are people that live in the country, work in the woods and live there and they know what they saw. Then the dang cat was captured by a crew with dogs the DNR hired. Guess what? It was a mt. lion. Not a bob cat, or a house cat, or a gopher. It was what the folks said it was.

For some reason or another the WI DNR didn't want to admit ther e were Mt. Lions in WI.

I like them. I think we could use a few. What is it going to hurt for the DNR to admit we have a few?

Not to mention that MN doesn't have any, but I have held in my hands a picture of one being held by the police officer that killed it in a city park in Bloomington, MN.

since I do what I do I can't/won't comment. those here who have shared a fire with me know I will play the devils advocate from time to time for conversation sake, but my feelings are solid, and I think I have a pretty good grasp on BOTH sides of the arguement.

I don't think any DNR has an "agenda".Sometimes they might make mis-speaks and an occasional mistake.
In Georgia,my former state of residence,there are no mountain lions.Plenty of private citizen sightings but "there are no mountain lions in the state of Georgia".
A couple of years back near my home town of West Point,Ga. a guy was deer hunting and a mountain lion walked under his stand.He shot and killed it.Started a real chit storm.The carcass was confiscated and he received a very healthy fine.I would have done the same thing he did and still will if the situation arises.S.S.S.

Stan in SC

thats great news Uncle Dusty! Keep it up and take care.

Tom, if it is just one incident by just one person, then I don't see what the "agenda" pushing is all about.

Here are some pretty reasonable statements about lion populations in MN and WI. I don't see an agenda in them or behind them and I don't think they are hiding anything from you.

http://www.dnr.state.mn.us/mammals/cougar/index.html

http://www.jsonline.com/news/wiscon...dwest-study-shows-hn5pd03-159061635.html

I would like to see documentation of a lion breeding in Thief River Falls. In a road side ditch, there just has to be photos and lots and lots of documentation if it were real, but I think that is just more internet legend. And for a DNR to say as much in a public meeting would put it all over the news. I know I know, they put up fences and surveillance and turned the place into a mini- Area 51...

Back when I was a grad student in Kansas, I had a black bear in my garden. Heck I even found perfect tracks that I made textbook plaster casts of the tracks. Yes indeed, a huge black bear right there in my garden. Of course I didn't believe it, nor did anyone else but my lab mate who had spotted a "for sure" Black LabraBear Retreiver the day before. She would believe anything. Maybe she works for MN DNR now...

Stan, be careful you don't poach a chickenbuck by mistake when you think you are poaching an agendized lion...

It has been out in the open and undisputed for several years now in MN, we have big cats. DNR does not try to deny it. I believe the first public statement in which MN DNR shared the confirmation with the general public was in a Duluth news paper several years back. That's the first one I knew of anyways where they openly and clearly confirmed the existence of big cats to the general public with a prepared statement.

That broke the ice, and since then there have been many cat stories in the news all over the state. Some recent ones that come to mind are the cat that was hit by a car by Bemidji and the guy that's in trouble for shooting one inside a culvert with an AR-15 in southern MN.

I don't believe there is any agenda with most of these things. I believe it's more of a political culture that representatives of wildlife offices abide by. I believe this is all mapped out by those a little higher up the ladder. And I believe this political culture is ever developing and changing with best intentions. Just as with any business.

Lets say it's an electric cooperative (power company). The company doesn't want a lineman or field serviceman out there interacting with the general public any way he pleases. He represents the company. You might have an employee that is personally completely off the grid, independent with solar panels, a small wind turbine, wood heat, a shack in the woods with an outhouse and maybe a half a dozen hamsters on a wheel powering a water pump.... whatever, this is America, each to their own. But you don't want that employee out there on calls jibber jabbering with customers like some crazy hippie preaching independence from "the man" and such. It just doesn't look good. You want that guy echoing the company�s planned public dialogue.

Same reason for a dress code, same reason for haircuts etc. For many years I�m sure the DNR was in a spot something like this : �Yeah we've got some cats, not we're not ready to talk about it yet, we're still trying to learn as much as we can so we can speak intelligently about it and not accidentally create a witch hunt or a panic throughout the state.�

I'm sure the considerations are layered pretty deeply.

So, I think I understand the structure, methods and reasoning for some of these contradictory interactions with the public.

That's fine. I actually sympathize.

Now, If the sumbiches could figure out how to flatten out the game licensing cycles and their effect on deer numbers.....

I swear that�s probably my only gripe. They issue too many tags for too many years then it seems they realize a little too late that they need to shut it down. It�s feast or famine with the deer tags in MN, god I wish they could learn to flatten that out a little.

Adgenda is probably not the right word. But the DNR really didn't want to admit for some reason or another there were big cats in that part of WI.

I worked with a few wardens and they gave me a the same reason on different occaisions why but I'd have to start a different thread...

I've been thinking about the hampster thing...do you think it will work?

Saw my first tree with "color" yesterday. A Maple.

No need to play either side of the middle too heavily on the cat topic.

Seriously, there is no need to mock the locals as if they are crazy for talking about a cat den. Also there is no need to mock the DNR right now for refusing to consider it as a reality.

It is actually straight down the middle.

Cat sightings are quite common in this area. We're not talking about bigfoot, we're talking about cats, they do exist. And the DNR doesn't deny it.

We do not have that struggle, that hunter/DNR struggle does not exist. It did at one time but not right now.

There are cats north of TRF, I hear about them quite often and there is no longer a bigfoot/UFO type of weirdness our doubt that goes along with it.

It has been clearly communicated between local hunters and local DNR, yes there are some cat's around, no you cannot shoot them just because you see them. It is illegal to shoot them.

If one of these cats should happen to be clearly hunting you, looking at you like you are lunch up in a tree..... actively pursuing you... Yeah that's different, shoot the damn thing. (be prepared to prove your case to a conservation officer though)


Same as if you find yourself in a life threatening situation with a crazed hunter named Chai Vang that is enraged and actively hunting you and your hunting party, shooting you, shooting your friends... You better shoot back, you better.


Likeliness of either scenario has got to be about equal.

Well said ND.

That area of MN from TRF north to the border has a diverse animal population including elk, moose, white tailed deer, black bear, wolves and big long tailed cats. There are even ocassional caribou that wander south from Canada although not many lately.