viiPREFACE
The chapters of this book cover differing but in some aspects overlapping objectives
for the study of mountain lions occupying the Black Hills region. In chapters 1 and 2, I
provide some history of the Black Hills region, beginning with the Custer reconnais-
sance in 1874, when the US Army surveyed the region with the aim, first, to document
resources such as geology and vegetation and then, later, in part, to find potential food
resources. In chapter 2 I pres ent an overview of the ecol ogy of the region, including
typical plants and animals, both of which were originally diverse; later restoration
efforts bolstered the elk and bighorn sheep populations currently inhabiting the region.
In chapter 3 the lead species, the mountain lion, is introduced, and I provide in-
formation to characterize the species, including how Black Hills lions are diff er ent
from other populations. As readers will ascertain, lions, because of their vast distri-
bution, are similar throughout North Amer i ca. However, seasoned biologists take
note of their most noteworthy or redeeming characteristics, especially those related
to the best techniques for capturing them for research purposes and how they use
their par tic u lar environment in their daily activities.
Chapters 4 through 7 are focused on the biology of the species. I start by providing
information on population dynamics, such as population growth, survival, and re-
production, and also explain how the species changed as it recolonized the Black
Hills. Chapter 5, which deals with disease ecol ogy, has a link with chapter 4, on pop-
ulation dynamics, because there was a potential for diseases to arise as the mountain
lion population became relatively dense in the region. Nutritional ecol ogy, the topic
of chapter 6, can be considered basic to the characterization of mountain lions over
the entire recolonization period. The same is true of the ge ne tics of mountain lions,
detailed in chapter 7, because we collected blood and tissue samples from captured
mountain lions throughout our studies as well as from numerous lion carcasses ob-
tained from the South Dakota Department of Game, Fish and Parks.
In chapter 8 I discuss how mountain lions were perceived by South Dakotans,
both early in our work and later, when the species became commonplace because of
its abundance. The harvest of the species has elicited public comment, and recre-
ationalists have viewed the predator negatively because they believed it caused a
reduction in the harvest allotment of game animals, in par tic u lar, elk. Fi nally, the
epilogue summarizes how the long- term nature of our work allowed us to better
understand the inner and outer workings of this secretive large carnivore and how it
recolonized a semi- isolated region of the country, the Black Hills.