Lincoln, Neb. -- A young male mountain lion was apparently killed by a semi on the Highway 20 bridge near Valentine on June 27 and the carcass was collected on July 3 by Nebraska Game and Parks Commission staff, according to Sam Wilson, the Commission's nongame mammal and furbearer program manager.
Wilson said when the carcass was recovered it was wearing a radio-tracking collar that indicated the mountain lion had traveled to Cherry County from the Black Hills region of South Dakota.
John Kanta of the South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks (SDGFP) confirmed the radio collar had been originally placed on the mountain lion in the Black Hills near the town of Pringle on Dec. 26, 2005, as part of a study by the SDGFP and South Dakota State University (SDSU) to determine mountain lion survival, densities, population trends and dispersal.
At the time the mountain lion was originally captured it weighed approximately 70 pounds and was determined to be 1-1.5 years old.
The location of this mountain lion was determined once a week by researchers from SDSU in the Black Hills area until the last location on April 13, in Custer State Park. The location of the mountain lion after that time was not known until the carcass was found and collected by Commission staff.
Young male mountain lions can disperse great distances and it has been assumed that mountain lions that have been documented in Nebraska over the last 15 years have been coming in part from the Black Hills, Wilson said.
This is the first confirmed documentation of this movement and the 31st mountain lion confirmation in Nebraska since the first modern confirmation in 1991.