Mark Elbroch: If We Want Mountain Lions the East, We'll Have to Bring Them

Species Unite

elizabeth novogratz

Society & Culture, Philosophy

5 • 911 Ratings

🗓️ 13 November 2024

⏱️ 36 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

"Why do we need large carnivores? Obviously as a scientist, I like talk about the biological roles that they play and the ecological roles, but I will drift and say that I think they're important for spirit and sort of human health more broadly, whether that be mental health, spiritual health, whatever, that sense of wildness that they bring to a landscape, that they force you to listen when you're in the woods, that you hear sticks break around you, that you hear what the birds are doing so that you know whether there's something coming around the next bend. These are all, in my opinion, truly enriching moments and necessary for human spirit and really for human health." - Mark Elbroch

Mark: [00:12:23] These are all, in my opinion, truly enriching moments and necessary for human spirit and [00:12:30] really for human health

Mark Elbroch is an ecologist and author, storyteller and the director of the Puma Program for Panthera, the global wild cat conservation organization.

Mark has been on the podcast before to talk about cougars, but something has changed since the last time he was on. For years, many people in the scientific community, and this is backed by research, have claimed that cougars would return to their historic range in the eastern US in the next 10 to 20 years.

But there's a new study from Panthera that says that this is not true, that they won’t make it to the East Coast even by 2100, which means, if we want cougars in the east we're going to have to help them.

This is a big deal because we do want cougars in the east. Large predators make fragile ecosystems strong. Mountain lions interact with nearly 500 other species and their reintroduction could lead to healthier forests, less zoonotic disease, and many other benefits.

Let’s bring cougars home!

Transcript

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0:00.0	Species.
0:09.0	Unite.
0:10.0	Why do we need large carnivores?
0:16.0	Obviously, as a scientist, I like to sort of talk about the biological roles that they play and the ecological roles. But I do, I will drift and say that I think they're important for, for
0:26.1	spirit and sort of human health more broadly, whether that be mental health, spiritual health,
0:32.1	whatever, that sense of wildness that they bring to a landscape, that they force you to listen when you're in the woods, that you hear sticks break around you, that you hear what the birds are doing so that you know whether there's something coming around the next bend.
0:48.3	These are all, in my opinion, truly enriching moments and necessary for human spirit and really for human health.
1:01.0	Hi, I'm Elizabeth Novagrats. This is Species Unite.
1:09.7	We have a favor to ask if you like today's episode and you have a spare minute, could you please rate and review Species Unite on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts.
1:22.2	It really helps people to find the show.
1:34.9	This conversation is with Mark Elbrock.
1:40.8	Mark is an ecologist, an author, a storyteller, and the director of the Puma program for Panthera, the global wildcat conservation organization.
1:45.8	Mark's been on the podcast before he came on to talk about cougars.
1:49.6	It's a really good episode about cougars, mountain lions, Pumas, panthers,
1:54.0	because they're all the same thing.
1:56.5	And he's back today because a lot of people in the scientific community,
2:00.0	and this is backed by research, have claimed for years that cougars or mountain lions would return to their historic range in the eastern United States sometime in the next 10 or 20 years.
2:12.3	But there's a new study from panthera that says that this isn't true, that cougars wouldn't make it to the East Coast on their own,
2:20.2	even by 2100, which means if we want them here,
2:24.8	and we do, because large predators make ecosystems much more resilient,
2:29.9	so we want them,
2:31.7	but that means we're going to have to move them.
	...

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