1,005 words
5 March 1996
Morning Edition
English
A stray cougar is roaming the suburban terrain of Newcastle County, Delaware, eluding police who are trying to corral him. Police Corporal Butch LeFebvre has been hot on the feline's trail since late December.
GUEST(S): BUTCH LEFEBVRE, Police Corporal, Newcastle County, Delaware (LIVE);
Canny Cougar Eludes Police in Suburban Delaware
ALEX CHADWICK, Host: Life is all about trade-offs and compromises. If you choose to live in the beautiful, untamed surroundings of Colorado or northern California, you probably expect a few unwanted brushes with local wildlife. The citizens of suburban Delaware usually don't have to worry about pesky interlopers, but for the past five months a cougar has been turning up in backyards as it wanders through the neighborhood. Newcastle County police corporal Butch LeFebvre is in charge of tracking and capturing alive the elusive cat.
BUTCH LEFEBVRE, Police Corporal, Newcastle County, DE: He'll go into the forest and the wooded areas, and he'll stay there, which a normal mountain lion will do. But then he does what he shouldn't do, and that's he'll show back up in one of the developments.
ALEX CHADWICK: When you say he shows up there, what do you mean?
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: He'll go right into a housing development and go right into people's backyards and down the middle of the street. He just travels anywhere he wants to travel and does not appear to afraid of anyone.
ALEX CHADWICK: Well, if he's so public in his appearances, how come it is that you can't catch him?
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: Well, when he's in a development, to be able to head him off, or in order to get him into the woods and everything, it's- it's real difficult. I mean, it's not like out west, where you have him in a couple-of-hundred-acre woods and you can just run him up a tree. I mean, this guy can go anywhere he wants, and he moves at a pretty rapid pace. I've had him go within about 10, 15 miles in a given night.
ALEX CHADWICK: Are you sure that you're tracking one cougar?
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: Well-
ALEX CHADWICK: Might- might there be more than one?
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: Well, yeah, that is a possibility. I don't have any proof to substantiate that yet, where I'm getting two sightings at two different locations. As far as I'm concerned right now, I only have one.
ALEX CHADWICK: Have you actually seen the animal?
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: Yes, I've seen him three times. The first time he had a deer kill, and I spotted him a few days after that in the same area. But last time I saw him he was on a golf course chasing a couple of deer.
ALEX CHADWICK: Corporal, why not just leave the cougar alone? Why bother it at all?
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: Well, there- there's been a lot of talk about that, and one of the problems is is that he does go into developments and he does go into the parks where there's a lot of people.
ALEX CHADWICK: But he's not doing anyone any harm. He seems to know to leave people alone.
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: Right, that's correct, but no one has got close enough to him for him to do any harm. If a young child would happen to come out of his back door and surprise him, or come running, you know, through a woods and surprise, maybe near one of his kills, then there's not any guarantee that he won't do that.
ALEX CHADWICK: This is an animal that escaped. It was- it was a pet, someone's pet?
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: Well, they're speculating that it was a pet and that it escaped, but no one can substantiate that. The problem is is that usually means that he's kept in a cage and they throw meat in there to feed him, and he still has all his claws and he still has all of his hunting ability, that they just call him a pet because he's in a cage.
ALEX CHADWICK: Corporal, isn't it possible that this animal is naturally occurring in this area? That is, perhaps cougars are coming back.
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: Oh, absolutely. I mean, that is a possibility. There's been reports in Pennsylvania and just about every state on the East Coast, reported sightings of cougars, and not too many people have taken them serious because they have not had them videotaped or actual pictures taken of them. But there is a very good possibility that, in fact, the cougars are coming back.
ALEX CHADWICK: How long are you going to keep hunting for this cougar?
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: Well, I'll keep hunting until my supervision decides that it's enough.
ALEX CHADWICK: And are you- are you working every day trying to do this?
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: That's correct, that's correct.
ALEX CHADWICK: You're working every day of the week?
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: Every day. I have not taken a day off.
ALEX CHADWICK: Well, how long have you been working trying to catch this animal?
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: Since the 29th of December.
ALEX CHADWICK: Huh. How come you don't take a day off?
BUTCH LEFEBVRE: Well, it's just that, you know, every day calls and prints come in, and possible sightings come in, and if you take a day off he- he can be another day ahead of you.
ALEX CHADWICK: Corporal Butch LeFebvre of the Newcastle County Police in Delaware is trying to catch a cougar.