126 Mountain Lions of the Black Hills
roadways that traverse the Black Hills region. Furthermore, the harvest limit had
been met each year since the season had been established, further indicating that
there were plenty of mountain lions in the Black Hills region.
Gigliotti (2012) compared the attitudes of South Dakota residents surveyed in 2002
(Gigliotti, Fecske, and Jenks 2002) with the attitudes of residents he surveyed in 2012.
In many of the general attitudes toward mountain lions, there was little change. For
example, the overall South Dakota residents’ response to the question “Having a
healthy, viable population of mountain lions in South Dakota is impor tant to me” in
2002 was relatively similar to the response received in the 2012 survey ( table 8.8).
Also, responses to the question “Having any mountain lions in South Dakota is too
dangerous a risk to people” ( table 8.9) were similar in the two time periods (Gigliotti
2012). This finding indicated that most South Dakota residents did not consider moun-
tain lions a threat, despite attacks documented in other states, such as California
(Torres et al. 1996), and other regions (Beier 1991). One potential reason for these re-
sponses could be that there had been no verified attacks on humans by wild moun-
tain lions ( there had been one or more historical attacks by captive mountain lions)
in the Black Hills; one suspected attack by a wild lion was unverified. When this one
Table 8.7. Comparison of attitudes of South Dakota residents in 2002
with Black Hills residents surveyed in 2008
Desired mountain lion
population for the Black Hills 2002 South Dakota residents 2008 Black Hills residents
Decrease greatly 11% 14%
Decrease slightly 13% 30%
Remain the same 42% 46%
Increase slightly 28% 8%
Increase greatly 6% 2%
Source: Gigliotti 2012.Table 8.8. Responses (2002 and 2012 surveys) to the statement “Having a healthy,
viable population of mountain lions in South Dakota is impor tant to me”
Attitude response 2002 SD residents 2012 SD residents
Strongly agree 13% 11%
Moderately agree 15% 16%
Slightly agree 19% 22%
Neutral / no opinion 28% 25%
Slightly disagree 7% 7%
Moderately disagree 6% 7%
Strongly disagree 12% 12%
Source: Gigliotti 2012.