Trail cameras near Voyageurs National Park in northern Minnesota captured footage of a female cougar and three large kittens in late March.
The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources said Thursday it’s the first time in more than a century there’s been documentation of a reproducing cougar population in the state.
“Looking at the footage was and still is surreal. We never anticipated seeing four cougars together in northern Minnesota,” said Thomas Gable, project lead of the University of Minnesota’s Voyageurs Wolf Project, which captured the video. “In total, we captured around four hours of footage of this cougar family. … It was fascinating to see and hear their interactions — the mother grooming her kittens, the kittens growling and hissing at each other. We feel incredibly fortunate we were able to capture such a wild moment in such detail.”
The video of the four cougars — also known as mountain lions or pumas — was captured by two trail cameras that Voyageurs Wolf Project researchers placed over a deer carcass northeast of Orr.
“In late March, we received a mortality signal from a GPS-collared deer and found the carcass buried under a pile of leaves on a hillside — a telltale sign of feline predation,” researchers wrote in notes accompanying the video posted online. “We suspected it was likely a bobcat but thought, just possibly, it could be a cougar. So we put up two trail cameras on the cached deer carcass and four hours later, two cougar kittens returned to the kill. The entire family showed up that evening and spent hours in front of our cameras.”
The project’s hundreds of trail cameras had previously recorded footage of lone cougars eight times in the past three years — but none of those sightings involved kittens.
Based on traits observed in the March video, “we estimate the kittens to be 7-9 months old, so born last fall,” John Erb, research biologist with the Minnesota DNR, said in a news release. “The only other confirmed kittens in Minnesota turned out to be captive escapees and involved a female with two kittens that showed up and hung around a homeowner’s porch in 2001.”
Cougars were native to Minnesota before becoming extinct within the state, according to the DNR. Over the past two decades, there have been dozens of sightings of lone cougars across Minnesota. They can travel more than 40 miles a day — and the DNR said those sightings have all appeared to be transient animals from Nebraska or the Dakotas.
Erb called the sighting of kittens “an important starting point for potential population establishment in Minnesota” but cautioned that it’s difficult to predict what will happen to the family.
“These kittens might not survive, potentially getting killed by wolves, a male cougar or vehicles. They may also become part of the founding catalyst for a slow but steady increase in numbers. Time will tell, but we are clearly nearing a point where the probability of a self-sustaining population has increased,” Erb said.
The March footage follows a sighting of two cougar kittens in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula last year.
The DNR said cougars almost always avoid human contact and are rarely seen. The animals are protected in Minnesota.
Find more information about cougars in Minnesota — including suggestions on what to do if you see one — on the DNR website.
