Money needs to be invested to give conservation officers more tools to help them avoid bringing out the shotgun, says a wildlife researcher.
Last weekend, three cougars were killed in the Garbaldi Highlands after they continually ventured into neighbourhoods and showed no signs of fear of people. The government provides a limited amount of funding to study endangered or rare species, but it is difficult to get grants to examine common wildlife, such as cougars and bears, said Sarah Dubois, manager of wildlife services for the Society of Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA).
"[Shooting the cougars] solves this incident now, but what do we do to prevent another one from happening?" she said. "Maybe we should be figuring that out so it doesn't happen again."
Staff at the Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations estimate there are between 5,150 to 7,000 cougars in the province, but Dubois noted there have been no recent population studies. The Province and researchers assume the B.C. cougar population is healthy through counts and observations gathered by hunters, she said, adding that cougars are a hunted species.
Big cats venturing into town sparks a lot of questions, Dubois said. They could be having difficulty finding deer or simply following them. The cougars might not be afraid of people because hazing tactics haven't been used against them, Dubois said, or they could simply be attracted to family pets because they are an easier catch. Cougars are prey-driven, she said.
Destroying animals is not a decision conservation officers take lightly, said Insp. Chris Doyle, the lead conservation officer for the Sea to Sky Corridor.
On Friday (Sept. 9) at around 8:30 p.m., conservation officers were called to a house in the Garibaldi Highlands, where a cougar was lounging in a home's backyard. Based on this summer's cougar reports, it was determined the cougar should be destroyed, Doyle said.
The next day, two more cougars were shot, all in separate incidents. Officials believe the cats were a mother and her two yearlings, Doyle said, noting that all were healthy, full-grown cougars.
"[Killing animals] is not a decision that we take lightly and it is not something that we want to do, but on the other hand we are mandated to protect public safety, as well as protecting wildlife," Doyle said.
This cougar family showed no fear of people, he noted. On the morning of Aug. 26, two cougars were found eating the remains of a household cat in front of a home on Tantalus Road. The next night a pair of cougars was spotted outside a house on Bluebird Place playing with the owner's shoes. In both cases, the cats weren't easily scared off by the homes' occupants.
"We did get a report of one of them stalking somebody the day before [the first shooting]," Doyle added.
An aggressive cougar caused the closure of several recreational trails near Alice Lake in mid-August. Two months earlier, a cougar also spooked a cyclist in Crumpit Woods, which led to the creation of a cougar patrol for the June 18 Test of Metal bike race.
The animals are usually elusive and secretive, Doyle said.
Conservation officers would not have shot the cats if they had occasionally entered municipal areas or even grabbed a house cat, but these cougars' behaviour was unusual, he said.
"It appeared like they were going out of their way to encounter people, as opposed to just being in the same place as them," Doyle said.
Last week's incident marks the first cougars to be destroyed in the area this year. This summer, one cat was also hit and killed on the Sea to Sky Highway. So far, Squamish conservation officers have received 145 reports of cougar sightings, the most of any municipality in the province.
