Proceedings of the Seventh Mountain Lion Workshop

146
RECONCILING SCIENCE AND POLITICS IN PUMA MANAGEMENT IN THE
WEST: NEW MEXICO AS A TEMPLATE
KENNETH A. LOGAN, Carnivore Researcher, Colorado Division of Wildlife, 2300 South
Townsend Avenue, Montrose, CO 81401, USA, email: Ken.Logan@state.co.us
LINDA L. SWEANOR, Scientist, Wildlife Health Center, University of California, TB128, Old
Davis Road, Davis, CA 95616, USA, email: lsweanor@mindspring.com
MAURICE G. HORNOCKER, Senior Scientist, Wildlife Conservation Society, Box 929,
Bellevue, ID 83313, USA
Abstract: The puma is the only large obligate carnivore thriving today in self-sustaining populations
distributed across western North America. As such, the puma contributes to ecosystem integrity because
the puma: 1) strongly influences energy flow and nutrient cycling; 2) is a strong natural selective force on
prey animals; 3) modulates prey population dynamics; 4) indirectly affects herbivory on plant
communities; 5) indirectly influences competition among herbivores; and 6) competes with other
carnivores. Furthermore, because persisting puma populations depend on expansive, connected wild
landscapes with thriving prey populations, the puma is also a potential focal species for designing nature
reserve networks. Wildlife managers have the responsibility of weighing the natural value of the puma
with the diverse needs of people. Yet, their tools for scientific puma management are crude mainly
because pumas are very cryptic and exist in very low population densities. People in New Mexico
identified 10 puma management issues: 1) pumas kill livestock and threaten rancher’s livelihoods; 2)
pumas kill deer that could be taken by hunters; 3) pumas threaten conservation of endangered populations
of mountain sheep; 4) some pumas threaten public safety; 5) sustainable puma hunting is desirable; 6)
puma hunting should focus on taking males and protecting females and cubs; 7) hunting pumas with dogs
is undesirable; 8) puma hunting is undesirable; 9) increased human development threatens puma
conservation; 10) diverse interests make puma management difficult. Unknowns and uncertainties
specific to puma management included: 1) number of pumas in populations; 2) population trends; 3)
population growth rates; 4) population responses to management prescriptions; 5) effects of hunter
selection; 6) density distributions; 7) age and sex structure of populations; 8) reproductive rates; 9) agespecific
survival rates; 10) immigration and emigration rates; 11) validity of puma population simulation
models. These unknowns and uncertainties along with the broad diversity of human values toward the
puma make management very difficult and challenge the professional integrity of agencies. In New
Mexico, we developed a robust, biologically sound, adaptive puma management structure that considers
the role of the puma in ecosystems, the needs of people, and the unknowns and uncertainties in puma
management. We called this structure Zone Management. Zone Management uses zones with lethal
control, sport-hunting, and refuges. Control zones allow experimental puma control in focal areas to
protect private property, human safety, endangered species, or game animals. Hunting zones allow sporthunting
opportunity sustained by quotas on the number of pumas that can be killed, with emphasis on
protecting females and cubs. Refuge zones (i.e., no hunting zones) are >3,000 sq. km and act as biological
savings accounts that assist wildlife managers by countering mistakes made in the control and hunt zones,
allowing natural selection to occur in puma populations, and providing numeric and genetic augmentation
of human impacted zones via puma dispersal from refuges and immigration into human exploited zones.
The zone management structure uses the source-sink metapopulation paradigm we developed for pumas
in New Mexico.
PROCEEDINGS OF THE SEVENTH MOUNTAIN LION WORKSHOP