When it comes to rare cats in Arizona, jaguars seem to get all the headlines. But ocelots are rarities in our state, too — and now, federal officials are moving to make sure these endangered felines don't become even more so.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have agreed to examine risks associated with how they trap and poison bobcats, coyotes, bears and other predators, Capitol Media Services reported last month. The move comes in response to a lawsuit filed by the Center for Biological Diversity, which argues that the current predator-control methods used by the departments pose a danger to ocelots.
While the agreement ends the nonprofit organization's lawsuit, it doesn't actually require that any changes be made to the agencies' trapping practices, Capitol Media Services reported. But it does require the agencies to update their analysis of the wildlife-control programs currently in use.
The Center for Biological Diversity says the ocelots' range in Arizona, which includes the Whetstone, Santa Rita and Huachuca mountains, appears to be expanding. The cats have been spotted at least five times in the state since 2009; that includes a dead ocelot found on a road near Globe, a treed one in the Huachucas in 2011 and one photographed in the Santa Ritas in 2014.
The species was listed as endangered in the United States in 1982, and there are believed to be fewer than 100 of them remaining in the U.S., most of them in the extreme southern part of Texas. They're widespread in Central America and most of South America.