THUNDER BAY — For the second time in less than a month, clear images of a cougar have been captured on a trail camera in the Thunder Bay area.
The most recent evidence that some cougars have wandered into Northwestern Ontario was discovered on Dec. 31 by Chris Maley, who lives in the Highway 61/Highway 130 area.
"It was just behind the house, a couple of hundreds yards, very close," Maley says, describing where he first noticed large paw prints in freshly-fallen snow.
At the time, he was taking his dogs for their regular morning walk.
Back at the house, when he checked the trail cam's SD card, at first Maley only saw images of rabbits and coyotes.
But the last sequence brought a surprise.
"The very last video was of the cat standing there, posing nicely. I didn't think I'd ever see one," Maley said.
He's not concerned that the cougar might pose a threat to his dogs.
"I'm not worried at all. I understand that it was just passing through. I don't think they're native here. I was just lucky enough to catch one, that's all."
Maley notified the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry, but no ministry staff have come out to his place.
An MNRF spokesperson told TBNewswatch that its district staff reviewed the video, and instructed Maley to report the incident online to the province's Natural Heritage Information Centre.
Last month, when a Kaministiquia-area resident also captured good pictures of a cougar on his property, the ministry acknowledged that there are some cougars in Ontario, but said it had no plans to conduct an on-site investigation.
Maley said he remained a skeptic about cougars in this area even after the Kaministiquia photos surfaced, but now that he has evidence of his own, that is no longer the case.
