January 21, 2011
This photo of a mountain lion was taken January 12, 2011, by a Chesterfield, Missouri resident. Photo courtesy of Missouri Department of Conservation.
This is the the first confirmed sighting in St. Louis County, Missouri, since 1994, and the 13th in the state since the animal was declared extinct in Missouri.
Mountain lions were largely driven from the state by deforestation and hunting by the 1920s. The state hasn’t had a breeding population in decades. The closest groups of cougars live in Nebraska and South Dakota.
The camera that captured the images of the mountain lion was set up by Chesterfield [Missouri] resident Garrett Jensen, a hunter and outdoors enthusiast. Jensen installed the Reconyx HC600 camera on a tree to monitor wildlife in the woods behind his home near Olive Boulevard and White Road.
The camera, which is triggered by heat and movement, automatically snapped a series of photos about 2:30 a.m. on Jan 12 [2011]. Jensen was out of town at the time and discovered the images after he returned home and retrieved the memory card and combed through 2,000 shots.
“I was like, ‘Oh, my God,’ I really couldn’t believe it had happened,” said Jensen, 36, the owner of a tree service company. “I feel really lucky. … I called everyone close to me and said, ‘You’re not going to believe this, I caught a mountain lion on my camera.'”StLToday.com
About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct).
Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015.
Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
Filed under Alien Big Cats, Breaking News, CryptoZoo News, Mystery Cats, Photos