It certainly is a crazy, mixed-up outdoors, not only in Michigan but in plenty of other places. The big flap in our state has to do with those elusive cougars. People who have seen one believe in them but others, not so fortunate, think they’re only imaginary or at least some big cats that had been pets, then were turned loose or escaped.

November 2, last year, a motorist reported hitting one with his car in southern Menominee County in the Upper Peninsula. When samples of the hair were collected from under the vehicle by Department of Natural Resources wildlife biologists, they sent it to Central Michigan University, where the DNR proved it had really come from a mountain lion.

Non-believers scoffed and claimed it was an isolated incident.

Prior to that, April 24, 2004, a woman in Monroe County saw two cougars behind her house at the far end of her property. She grabbed her video camera and caught them on tape at a tree line. That led non-believers to claim they had only been a pair of house cats.

The Michigan Wildlife Conservancy (MWC) has been working to collect proof that this state has an actual breeding population of cougars living in the wild here in Michigan. An investigation, conducted by David G. Townsend, of Forensic Examination Service of Mason, got a copy of the video taken by Carol Stokes and had extra prints made of it.

“Any objective person, with common sense, would realize the cats shown in the video are not house cats,” Mr. Townsend said. His forensic study and site investigation was also analyzed by MWC and Future Media Corporation of Okemos.

After obtaining a copy of the same tape, I carefully watched all 17 minutes of it. The trees at the line were measured, then compared to the sizes of the large and small cougars. Had they been only house cats, they couldn’t have been seen above the grass and other ground cover.

Video expert Bob Bishop of Future Media Corporation, with 36 years of experience in such matters, made split-screen comparisons with objects of known size, filmed by the same camera and from the same location. Mr. Bishop concluded the animals were approximately six feet long, far larger than any house cats. Both cougars had the same tawny coloration plus the long tail with black tip.

Cougars have also been seen and documented at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in Leelanau and Benzie counties. The National Park Service has seen fit to erect signs to notify all visitors that cougars are in the area. This is not to frighten anyone, but to respect the big cats, as should be done with all wild animals.

Deer are the natural food for cougars and there is no kind of shortage in Michigan. Authorities also know that when a cougar has a full stomach, it offers little or no danger to humans. Curiosity may cause a cougar to follow a hiker in the woodlands, when standing still or walking slowly are recommended.