Keep Lions in the Americas
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Mountain Lion/Cougar/Puma/Catamount(Puma concolor) still exist in various parts of North America, after significant population reduction through hunting and loss of habitat. They tend to be solitary and reclusive animals by nature. In my part of the midwest, they are seldom sighted, but it is a regional news event when they are. One group of the (human) populace finds the idea terrrifying, the other group finds the idea exhilirating. There are concerns about the cats attacking pets, kids, old folks, and especially livestock, though there isn't much evidence so far.
That's all lead up to the idea that a prairie & open woods hunting American Lion (Pantera leo atrox) would scare the bejeebers out of any human, particularly livestock raising farmers. That would have been a war to extirmination, I think.
That's all lead up to the idea that a prairie & open woods hunting American Lion (Pantera leo atrox) would scare the bejeebers out of any human, particularly livestock raising farmers. That would have been a war to extirmination, I think.
Much like with wolves, but even more intense and with more devastation to the population, I think. Hard for full-sized lions to hide.
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Yup, especially the historic American Lions - big animals that worked the open ground in search of pliestocene megafauna and whatever else got in their path. Mountain Lions have survived as they do tend to stay way out of sight. They are there, but you don't see them....
if American lions operated the same way as African lions, it seems that bison would be about the only prey they'd have... unless they want to go into the woods and chase down moose and elk. So once the bison are gone, so are the lions. If they operate differently (more solitary, not living just in the grasslands), then they might hang on in the less populated areas of the west...
African lions have numerous prey choices including but not limited to wildebeests, zebra, and Cape buffalo. In North America only the bison existed in a manner making it a long term viable food choice for pride forming lions. Perhaps keeping a wild horse species and a plains oriented elk as further prey would allow their survival, but this would have changed a lot in human history as well. Surviving horses would have totally altered Native American society with many knock on effects post contact.
Wolves and lions would probably share the same prey so once humans started also hunting bison, elk, and moose, we might see wolves become practically extinct in places with heavy lion populations. Kind of like how in Siberia where there are large populations of tigers, there are very few wolves.
Firstly, I've seen the American Lion also described as Nagle's Giant Jaguar, so the extinction may have just been of the larger species of Jaguar.
Secondly, the lion retreated from Europe as well as North America in prehistoric times and European fauna was similar to North American. So the retreat of the lion is probably akin to broad brush things like climate change, and not human interaction.
Secondly, the lion retreated from Europe as well as North America in prehistoric times and European fauna was similar to North American. So the retreat of the lion is probably akin to broad brush things like climate change, and not human interaction.
No, Examples from the La Brea Tar Pits show that these were true lions, very similar to African Lions but a bit larger.
Furthermore a sub-species of lion existed in Greece and the Balkans well into historical times. This is different from the Cave Lion that went extinct much earlier. Balkan Lions were almost certainly killed off by human action.
Recent studies have shown that the North American megafauna extinction was almost certainly caused by humans. Limit this somehow and it's likely lions would be one of the easier species to keep alive so long as they have ample prey.
I had never heard of neagles giant jaguar until I went to the le brea tar pits, I am happy with the idea that the American lion was the same as the European cave lion, but the idea that it isn't does exist. Both became extinct millennia ago, long before humans gained a stranglehold on the environment.
Iiuc the lions in the Balkans are not cave lions but the western most range of the Asian lion, the same species that was in turkey and Iran until recently. Since this species lingered on in places with a lot more people than the Balkans had in 100ad, which makes me think that humans weren't the driving force in their extinction.
Iiuc the lions in the Balkans are not cave lions but the western most range of the Asian lion, the same species that was in turkey and Iran until recently. Since this species lingered on in places with a lot more people than the Balkans had in 100ad, which makes me think that humans weren't the driving force in their extinction.
or maybe it would be like lions and hyenas in Africa... they live in the same areas, compete for the same prey, and kill each other quite often...
That seems odd. I can see a pride of lions easily holding its own (as well as giving back worse) against a pack of wolves. But against a lone tiger, the wolves could simply beat them by harassing them until exhaustion kicked in. It'd be a bit more dangerous than going against a bear perhaps, but they are relentless enough to do it.
How does that go in Siberia? Wolves make themselves the top dogs in Yelowstone, I could see tigers not taking much shit from wolves in Siberia, a couple of casual kills and the wolves would get the message.
Tigers don't necessarily need to kill wolves (though maybe this explains their hatred of dogs described in the book Monster of God). They just need to outcompete them in hunting.
Mind you, wolves can be very flexible in their prey. They could live side by side with lions, hunting smaller prey like white-tailed deer while the lions focus on other surviving megafauna like shrub ox and large animals like elk, moose and bison. In this scenario coyotes would be pushed further to the ecological fringe, perhaps taking a niche as scavengers to lion kills.
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I don't know how adaptable (large species) lions are in altering what they hunt. Is that part of why they are mostly limited to savanna parts of Africa?
Pack hunting wolves have historically had a hard time adapting to living alongside humans. Humans have tried to wipe them out as a threat to our food source (hunted or domestic animals) and a direct threat to ourselves (real or percieved) They have had limited recent success in being reintroduced to populated parts of North America, as long as they are protected.
Coyotes have proved themselves astonishingly adaptable to modern urban/suburban/rural life. They are everywhere in the US Midwest today. The same is probably true across large parts of North and maybe Central America
Typically, I think you see limited overlap in range between Wolves and Coyotes. That might apply to Lions and Wolves as well....
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Lions used to cover all of Africa apart from the Sahara desert and the Congo rainforest and in Eurasia from Greece to India apart from the Arabian desert, a vast area which has all sorts of habitat types not just savannah. In fact all 4 of the big cats used to inhabit vast swathes of territory in historic times, which makes me think that if given half a chance they will live almost anywhere.
in fact, to use a still living example, cougars live in every environment on both American continents except for the Arctic: they're in desert, jungle, boreal forest, TEMPERATE forest, marshes, mountains, plains, AND increasingly in urban settings