Phylum : Chordata
Class : Mammalia
Order : Carniora
Suborder : Feliformia
Family : Felidae
Genus : Puma
Species : Puma concolor couguar
Eastern cougar or eastern puma (Puma concolor cougar) refers to the extinct or extirpated population of cougars that once lived in northeastern The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has confirmed the Eastern Cougar or Eastern Puma is extinct and removed it from the endangered species list. Eastern pumas, also known as mountain lions, were killed off throughout the 1700s and 1800s. The last one was killed in Maine in 1938. Western pumas disperse widely and have shown up as far east as Connecticut.
Today’s final removal of the eastern puma from the endangered list clears the way for states like New York to reintroduce cougars from the widespread and abundant western population. A different subspecies of the puma, the Florida panther, survives in a small, isolated and precarious population at the rapidly urbanizing southern tip of Florida. These animals, too, were once widespread, from their namesake state north to Georgia and west to Arkansas and eastern Texas.
Pumas were once the most widely distributed mammal in the Americas, extending from the Yukon in Canada to the southern tip of South America. The extermination of pumas along with wolves and lynx led to the current overabundance of white-tailed deer and accompanying declines in tree regrowth because the deer eat acorns and saplings as well as loss of vegetative cover needed by ground-nesting birds.
More details: http://www.iucnredlist.org
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