10/04/2024
Things have not been going great on the farm. The last 2 months have been both emotionally and financially taxing for us and we wanted to share our plight with you.
We would appreciate you sharing our story to help put pressure on the Ontario government to help us.
TLDR; we have a cougar problem.
Update! MnR are coming to investigate next week 🙌
Where to start...
Late this August our new ram lamb went missing from our fully fenced pasture. We thought it was a fluke as we only found some of his wool near the fence line and in the surrounding forest but nothing else.
That night we heard a strange chirping noise in the forest which started after sundown and continued for a few minutes. I recorded the sound using the Merlin Bird App which could not identify the call despite multiple attempts.
2 weeks later, 2 of our ram lambs born this year went missing. Same thing - both lambs disappeared, no gore, no blood, just some fleece strewn around indicating they had been attacked and then carried away and over the fence. I say over because there was no fleece on the fence and no change to the fence structure (no bent bars).
At this point, we started to consider possible predators and the only one that made sense was a cougar. The recording I captured, when compared with cougar vocalizations is uncanny. We knew we had a dangerous predator on our hands.
We contacted MnR immediately and were told to send the evidence we had collected. We did, including the sound recording and images of foot prints near the fence line. MnR told us that cougars have been extinct in Ontario for over 100 years so it must just be a coyote. They also told us that the sound we recorded was a Carolina Wren and suggested we run the sound through the Merlin Bird App to confirm 🤦♀️
With this very unhelpful answer from MnR we decided to keep the sheep penned in our upper paddock which is about 50 feet from our house. Despite this, a week later, one of our ewes was taken meaning the cougar was brave enough to sn**ch her from just a few feet from our house.
We installed trail cams and added deterrents like a radio and lights. We only let the sheep out to pasture, the back of part of which is maybe 300 feet from our house, during daylight hours and had them returned to the upper paddock by dinner time.
Despite this, just last week our ram was attacked while AJ was outside doing farm chores just a hundred feet away! Luckily he (our ram) got away and survived.
Finally, yesterday our last ram lamb was taken during daylight hours - sometime between 9AM and 4PM.
We reported the disappearances to the Township as required but unfortunately, they too have been unable to help. Our firm belief is that this is a cougar killing our sheep, one that is not afraid of people or normal deterrents. Our trail camera captured what we believe is the cougar just one night before our latest ram went missing.
Because we don't have a body (which is typical for cougars), the Province is refusing to investigate. Without an investigation, we are not entitled to any type of Provincial compensation.
We have multiple deterrents that aren't working, when we keep the sheep penned, the cougar just comes closer to the house. We only let the sheep out to pasture during daylight hours and the cougar is bold enough to still attack. Additionally our calf Olive suffered from multiple ailments at once, costing us a hefty vet bill which we think was brought on by the stress of being penned.
We are at a loss of what to do. The township, Province and MnR won't help us. At this rate our entire flock of sheep will be gone in a few months.
I have included much of the evidence we have collected in this post. Cougars are protected animals (despite MnR swearing they don't exist in Ontario), so we can't actively hunt it. It needs to be trapped and relocated which can only be done by the Province.
