{"id":235289,"date":"2025-10-19T02:02:13","date_gmt":"2025-10-19T02:02:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/235289\/"},"modified":"2025-10-19T02:02:13","modified_gmt":"2025-10-19T02:02:13","slug":"21-confirmed-cougar-sightings-in-the-up-this-year-heres-where-outdoors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/235289\/","title":{"rendered":"21 confirmed cougar sightings in the UP this year. Here&#8217;s where | Outdoors"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>MARQUETTE, Mich. (WBUP\/WJMN) \u2014 There have been 21 confirmed cougar sightings in the Upper Peninsula so far this year, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/app.powerbigov.us\/view?r=eyJrIjoiMTVlNjE2ODMtZmIwZi00OTkyLWJkZjQtMTE1MDY4NmUwYzNkIiwidCI6ImQ1ZmI3MDg3LTM3NzctNDJhZC05NjZhLTg5MmVmNDcyMjVkMSJ9\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">data<\/a> from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (DNR).<\/p>\n<p>The DNR records reported cougar sightings on its website, providing insights into the whereabouts of Michigan cougar populations. Sighting evidence is usually a photograph, video, or confirmed cougar tracks. This year, the majority of cougar sightings happened in the western U.P., south of Mass City.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.myupnow.com\/news\/crime\/my-up-investigates-training-revealed-as-massive-secretive-search-for-human-remains\/article_00cb99fe-aa75-4428-ae9b-4442ac24af7e.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">My UP Investigates: &#8216;Training&#8217; revealed as massive, secretive search for human remains\u00a0near Grand Marais<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Another sighting took place southeast of Harvey and the sighting furthest to the east took place northeast of McMillan. You can see a heatmap of the sightings here:<\/p>\n<p>                        <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"data:image\/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAAQAAAADCAQAAAAe\/WZNAAAAEElEQVR42mM8U88ABowYDABAxQPltt5zqAAAAABJRU5ErkJggg==\" alt=\"DNR confirmed cougar sightings heatmap\" class=\"img-responsive lazyload full blur\" width=\"972\" height=\"415\" data- data-\/><\/p>\n<p>             <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/68f29311046de.image.png\" alt=\"\" aria-hidden=\"true\" loading=\"lazy\" height=\"85\" width=\"200\"\/><\/p>\n<p>The Michigan Department of Natural Resource&#8217;s (DNR) heatmap of confirmed cougar sightings for 2025. (Photo courtesy of the DNR)\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The DNR noted that these sightings aren&#8217;t indicative of the population, with some sightings possibly being the same animal seen by different people.<\/p>\n<p>Since 2020, cougar sightings have been increasing. Only 15 were seen in 2020, the number reaching a high in 2024 at 23 sightings.<\/p>\n<p>The DNR&#8217;s data goes back to 2008, with a total of 155 confirmed sightings. All of these sightings took place in the Upper Peninsula, aside from a June 21, 2017, photograph of a Lower Peninsula cougar northeast of Lansing.<\/p>\n<p>COPYRIGHT 2025 BY MY UP NOW \u2013 WBUP\/WJMN. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. THIS MATERIAL MAY NOT BE PUBLISHED, BROADCAST, REWRITTEN OR REDISTRIBUTED<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MARQUETTE, Mich. (WBUP\/WJMN) \u2014 There have been 21 confirmed cougar sightings in the Upper Peninsula so far this&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":235290,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[79,201],"class_list":{"0":"post-235289","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235289","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235289"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235289\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/235290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235289"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235289"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235289"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}