Cougars in Southern Ontario

I've been reading reports from the police activity press releases that lots of people have spotted a cougar near the town of Chatham, Ontarion--where I live.

Here's an example:

Yesterday, we passed along a warning to you from Chatham-Kent Police to watch out for roaming deer when driving. Today, police have their minds on cougars. They say a Ridgetown woman called them around 10 last night and told them she spotted what appeared to be a cougar in the area of some railway tracks near the Ridgetown Feed Mill. Officers responded but didn't find anything. Police say there've been other such sightings in southeast Chatham-Kent in recent weeks.

I've seen cougars in Manitoba in the early 90's. I once parked my car an followed one near the Saskatchewan border. I would never expect to find one in Southern Ontario--but who knows! They are supposed to follow the range of deer.

There are lots of wild animals in southern Ontario but most of us don't see most of them. It is almost impossible to see a porcupine (unless a dog catches one) or a fox yet they are plentiful.

Don cougars go by several other names?

Porcupines?

I have seen live ones many times here in New Brunswick as well as a time or two in Nova Scotia.

We've got lots of opossoms and racoons here. I mostly see them as road kill.

Cougars are also called Pumas, Catamounts and Mountain Lions.

I have seen many live racoons here.

I also saw a live one get hit by a car and sadly watched it die. I stopped to let three racoons cross the road in front of me. One turned back, one went across safely, the other one stopped in front of me, took a good look at me and then started to continue to cross the road upno which he was hit by a car coming in the opposite direction. I saw him going through the agony of dieing, and then he lie still on the road.

It's things like this that adds to my longing for the Lord to come and end all of this death and dieing and suffering.

It's terrible to see God's creation suffer. Especially if they can't reason it out. I still remember watching the look in the eye of a Moose that I stopped to let cross on a Manitoba road at dusk only to have a guy in a half-ton pick-up slam into the creature. The truck was damaged quite a bit. The man's hands were bloodied from the glass in front of him breaking. We hauled the carcas off the road.

Fortuanately the moose was killed on impact so it didn't suffer--except for that split-second look.