Destruction Bay residents keep eyes, cameras out for cougars

Some neighbours in Destruction Bay, Yukon, have set up an informal warning system to alert others of regular visits by cougars in their community.

As well, at least one resident hopes to capture a photograph of the elusive large cat to convince other Yukoners that they are living in cougar country.

"You can usually see them at least a couple of times a day. One of them has had to chase it out of their yard a few times now. So everybody up here knows that it's a cougar," Brenda Guthrie told CBC News.

"We're hoping that with the conservation officer's camera and with our camera, that we'll catch it."

Last week, wildlife officers with the Yukon's Conservation Department sent out camera gear to Destruction Bay, a community of 55 located 210 kilometres west of Whitehorse.

If a roaming cougar is caught on camera, it will be the first confirmed sighting of a cougar in the Yukon.

Guthrie said that for the past few weeks, all of her neighbours have had an informal cougar-spotting network in place in which they regularly call each other to report the big cats' presence in their yards and under their houses.

"We're all working together," she said. "Everybody warns each other when we hear them or see them."

Despite the regular appearances, Guthrie said she has had trouble capturing those sightings with a camera.

In the meantime, her family's daily routines have changed to make sure they don't fall victim to the big cats. Guthrie said she does not put her dog out in the yard anymore, and her small children are never out of her sight.

"Even if we take them into the car, we take them one at a time or each one of us takes one," she said. "They don't go outside."

The Yukon has had one confirmed cougar sighting, of a dead cougar found in 2000 near Watson Lake. Officials said it appeared to have crawled into an abandoned vehicle, where it starved to death.