HUFFINGTON
09.30.12
WILD KINGDOM
“Well, we’ve amassed enough
information now to suggest that
this is happening.”
Cat Calls
Bo Ottmann and his fellow cougar
enthusiasts say they are simply
trying to do the same thing, and
they deeply resent suggestions
that they don’t know what they
are talking about.
A week before I joined Ottmann in the woods, we visited
the home of Bill Betty, a retired
defense factory worker and the
prime mover behind New England’s cougar awareness effort.
Several years ago, he began delivering a self-made and rather
lively PowerPoint presentation on
cougars at libraries and Audubon
chapters across New England.
Ottmann attended one of these
shows in 2007 and the two have
been collaborating ever since.
Betty is something of a cougar
magnet, claiming to have had
at least 14 encounters with mountain lions in Rhode Island —
several at close range — since
the early 1970’s.
“I would occasionally see
mountain lions in Rhode Island,
in places where they were never
supposed to be — in the middle
I t’s really hard for a state
agency that says ‘We have no
confirmations of cougars in
our state’ to actually spend
time and money on it when
it’s not a pressing issue.”
of the town at 1 o’clock in the afternoon,” he says. “I would tell
people and they would dismiss it
or even make fun of it. But then
they’d come back two days later
and apologize because 25 people
told them the same thing. These
were real events. They were not
figments of anyone’s imagination.”
A rotund, gruff and fast-talking
man, Betty grows quickly agitated
when asked about the sentiments
of biologists like Paul Rego or
Clay Nielsen.
“I’m so tired of these guys. They
are so boring. They have the same
lines over and over again. ‘If there
were mountain lions here, I wouldah knowed it,’” he says in mocking
voice. “I’ve had so many assholes
tell me stupid shit like that.
“The Cougar Network are some
of the most anal retentive guys
I’ve ever met in my life,” he adds,