Intensity of this print was digitally enhanced; the original large one is unchanged.	No digital enhancement of either the small or the large jpg of this picture.

This is an initial report on probable cougar prints that were found in very soft mud around a pond in a grassy area in NW Lyon County, Iowa (1/4 SE of 1/4SW of section 29 T100N R47W).  Eventually a fuller report will be available when I have made pictures of the casts and incorporated the excellent field sketches of Travis Pollema. Part of the reason for sharing an initial report is that a local newspaper, the Doon Press published a short story (Dec. 18, 2003) on the prints including one of Travis's pictures.  I thought an initial report with some more pictures should be available on this web page.

These prints were found by Bill and Pete Kooi, who invited me to come to the pond to look at them.  I drove up the afternoon of November 20 and found excellent prints in very soft mud.  A Dordt student, Travis Pollema. who is interested in my tracking of local cougars came along.  Both he and I took a number of  pictures.  Two that Travis Pollema took are displayed at the top of this page. In most cases we included either a 6 inch ruler or a yardstick in the picture.   I made plaster of Paris casts of four of them. Travis drew good field sketches of where the prints were located, which will be incorporated into a fuller report. Since there were no prints in the mud on the day of the 18th when Pete Kooi was at the muddy area, we can be quite confident the "cat" made them on the night of November 18th or the morning of the 19th [the month is off on the jpg name of  Travis's pictures but right on the date stamped on the picture].

From the raccoon prints in the upper right of this picture (large jpg - will load slowly on modem) and the interest the cat seemed to show in going to the water's edge at least three times (at places where there were raccoon prints) and one time  leaping into the mud (large print), we surmised that the "cat" was hunting raccoon.  There was no indication of blood or hair so I think the raccoon escaped.  When the cat came out of the mud from the place where he leaped, he left mud tracks on the concrete walkway. These tracks show the cat starting to speed up.   Right after running on the cement walk the cat again went down again into the mud.  Bill Kooi is pointing to this muddy area in this picture.

While these prints have not yet been confirmed by cougar expert as cougar prints, they conform in several regards more to cat than dog prints.  A comparison of the prints with a good cougar track page by Kim Cabrera show that they have the three lobes typical of cat and distinctive from dog.  They are also wider and not as oval as a dog track.  They do show claw prints (which cats do not generally show), but in the very soft mud I would expect the cat might stick out his claws for better traction.  If they are cat, their size (3 to 4 inches wide) makes them a BIG CAT - most likely cougar).   I am willing to think they are likely cougar but will not say it is confirmed as cougar until I get a person who has tracked cougar to confirm them for me.  For now I will rank this as 6 or probable.

Revised on  January 2, 2004 (5:07PM)