After decades of denying it, Michigan's DNR admits at least one cougar exists (or existed) in the Upper Peninsula. Eric Sharp skewers the agency for its continuing reluctance to face the implications of a cougar population.
"...[T]he DNR has no plans for a cougar management program. Its biologists say there's no proof cougars are breeding in Michigan and any seen probably wandered in from Wisconsin or are escaped pets. (In the '70s and '80s, some DNR officials attributed loose cougars to Detroit drug dealers.)
"That argument won't hack it anymore. It's threadbare, flies in the face of common sense and DNA evidence, and it violates the state Endangered Species Act."
http://www.freep.com/sports/outdoors/outcol24e_20050224.htm