Sightings of mountain lions in the state have dropped, but Iowa DNR furbearer biologist Vince Evelsizer says there are still some of the animals out there.
“There’s been a little bit of activity on that front in south-central, southeast Iowa with one or two individual mountain lions down there that we know about thanks to folks reporting trail camera photos and things like that to our staff down there,” he says.
There also continue to be sightings in the northern corner of the state. “In northwest Iowa, there’s a collared mountain lion that’s been there since August. That was collared in Nebraska about a year ago and moved into Iowa on its own, and has been here since that time,” Evelsizer says. “And we’ll see if that cat keeps moving east and continues traveling or if it stays here in Iowa for a while.”
Evelsizer says the big cats try to stay away from humans, but there is a chance you could see them during the winter. “Mountain lions are weather tolerant, so they’re active year round and they usually have a fairly big home range, and the primary diet or pray for the mountain ion that they hunt, whether it’s winter or summer are things like deer and other small mammals, they’re a carnivore, of course,” Evelsizer says.
There haven’t been many recent bear sightings, but Evelsizer says there are still some out there as well. “We still think that there’s a few black bears in Iowa at this time. In other words, two to four black bears. Maybe in Iowa at this time and may over winter again in our state,” he says. Evelsizer says the bears will soon head into their dens for their long winter nap. “Typically they do that some around this time and on end in November sometime depending on the weather and photo period, length of daylight triggers that,” he says.
Evelsizer says bear sightings always pick up in the spring when they come out of hibernation and are hungry and looking for food.