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The cougar (Puma concolor) (/ ˈkuːɡər /, KOO-gər), also known as the panther, mountain lion, catamount and puma, is a large cat native to the Americas. It inhabits North, Central and South America, making it the most widely distributed wild, terrestrial mammal in the Western Hemisphere, and one of the most widespread in the world.
The North American cougar (Puma concolor couguar) is a cougar subspecies in North America. It is the biggest cat in North America (North American jaguars are fairly small). [4][5] It was once common in eastern North America and is still prevalent in the western half of the continent. This subspecies includes populations in western Canada, the ...
Puma (/ ˈ p j uː m ə / or / ˈ p uː m ə /) is a genus in the family Felidae whose only extant species is the cougar (also known as the puma, mountain lion, and panther, [2] among other names), and may also include several poorly known Old World fossil representatives (for example, Puma pardoides, or Owen's panther, a large, cougar-like cat of Eurasia's Pliocene).
The eastern cougar or eastern puma (Puma concolor couguar) is a subspecies designation proposed in 1946 for cougar populations in eastern North America. [2][3] The subspecies as described in 1946 was declared extinct by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 2011. [4] However, the 1946 taxonomy is now in question. [5]
The Florida panther had for a long time been considered a unique cougar subspecies, with the scientific name Felis concolor coryi proposed by Outram Bangs in 1899. [10] A genetic study of cougar mitochondrial DNA showed that many of the purported cougar subspecies described in the 19th century are too similar to be recognized as distinct. [11]
P. c. wavula (Lesson, 1842) The South American cougar (Puma concolor concolor), also known as the Andean mountain lion [4] or puma, [5] is a cougar subspecies occurring in northern and western South America, from Colombia and Venezuela to Peru, Bolivia, Argentina and Chile. [6]
A taxonomist decides whether to recognize a subspecies. A common criterion for recognizing two distinct populations as subspecies rather than full species is the ability of them to interbreed even if some male offspring may be sterile. [4] In the wild, subspecies do not interbreed due to geographic isolation or sexual selection. The differences ...
Category:Cougar. Category. : Cougar. Articles relating to the cougar ( Puma concolor ), a large cat native to the Americas. Its range spans from the Canadian Yukon to the southern Andes in South America and is the most widespread of any large wild terrestrial mammal in the Western Hemisphere .