The decline in the number of specimens occurred before 1950, when it was still legal to hunt panthers. The species was classified in danger of extinction in 1967 and is protected by federal and state laws.
At least 20 panthers died in Florida during 2020, most of them from road accidents in the state, a figure below the previous two years that, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC, for its acronym in English), is a reason for alert on the reproduction of the species.
The Florida panthers, a protected subspecies of the American cougar, of which there are approximately only between 120 and 230 specimens, have their greatest danger in motorway freeways, although this year they have joined in against the coronavirus pandemic.
According to the statistics of the FWC, which has a guide for people living in areas where there are panthers and a map of sightings, which shows that the south of the state is its main stronghold, death hides on the road to these beautiful animals.
This year a specimen was killed by another panther, another was hit by a train, and a person intentionally killed a third specimen, leaving its mutilated body on the side of a highway near Immokalee in Collier County.
All other specimens of these felines found dead this year were hit by cars. According to contrasted data from the Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, last year 27 panthers died, while in 2019 about 30.
“Normally we say that the number of deaths and kills of panthers increases with the size of the population” of these animals, said Dave Onorato, a panther biologist at FWC, according to the Miami Herald.
Under that logic, a lower death count could spell bad news for the endangered species. “It’s plausible. We don’t want to give it too much importance yet, but it certainly grabs our attention,” Onorato noted.
Precisely, 2020 began fatefully with four fatalities for the Florida panther, also known as the mountain lion or cougar.
One factor complicating the 2020 figures is that biologists have tracked fewer panthers with radio-frequency collars. The work of these scientists has been hampered in part by the covid-19 pandemic.
“We don’t want to be responsible for transmitting (the disease) to panthers,” Onorato said.
It is the last subspecies still surviving in the eastern United States. The big drop in specimen numbers occurred before 1950, when it was still legal to hunt panthers. The species was classified in danger of extinction in 1967 and is protected by federal and state laws.
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