WAUSAU, WI – Mountain lions once roamed the lands of Wisconsin but there is no breeding population in the state today.
According to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, despite Wisconsin not having a breeding population, reports of wild cougar sightings in Wisconsin have been increasing in recent years, though the species was thought to have disappeared from the state around 1910.
While early reports in the 1940s were likely from escaped captive cougars or cases of misidentification, more recent sightings have been verified.
Since 1991, the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has implemented a system to track reports of rare mammals, including cougars.
As of July 2024, the DNR has confirmed or classified as probable a total of 22 cougar sightings this year, according to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.
These sightings are believed to involve transient male cougars, likely dispersing from a breeding population in South Dakota’s Black Hills. There is currently no evidence that cougars are breeding in Wisconsin, according to the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.