It’s not your fault if you’ve mistaken a Cougar as a species different from a Mountain Lion. We have all been there, confused over Cougar vs. Mountain Lion. Often, these two nouns are used interchangeably, but they relate to the same animal. Cougars can be found typically in South America. As a feline, it is blessed with excellent hearing, incredible sight, and a swift body. All these attributes make it an exemplary predator. South America has an abundance of this species. They are widespread from North through South America, covering much of the western hemisphere.

Cougar and mountain lion are the same species, same animal, but they are often interpreted as different. They both are a part of the species Puma concolor. A cougar has a bounty of synonyms like puma, mountain lion, panther, mountain cat, mountain screamer, painters, catamounts, and many more. Cougars hold the Guinness World Record for having the most names. Aside from a few differences in body size and other characteristics, these are the same animals.

Mountain Lions

Mountain lions are most commonly found from Canada to the Southern Andes, covering a significant part from West to South America. They generally inhabit the colder mountainous regions, hence why the name. Their name is also derived from Gato Monte, which translates to ‘a cat of the mountain’.

• Characteristics: Mountain lions are large cats with tawny-beige fur. They are observed to have silvery fur in the underbelly, which differs from the cougar’s tawny coat. Generally, males weigh between 115 and 220 pounds, while females weigh between 64 and 141 pounds. A fully grown adult can reach up to 8 feet in length, from nose to tail.
• Food Habits: Their diet mainly consists of rats, sheep, elk, and deer. They also prey on animals such as bighorn sheep, rabbits, wild camelids, turkeys, mules, and moose. Some mountain lions can eat a whole porcupine or other quills, seemingly without harm.
• Habitat: Mountain lions are observed to inhabit an expansive range of biodiversity. They are generally found in wetlands, forests, deserts, mountains, and dense wilderness. They are highly adaptive cats. They do not migrate or hibernate in winter. They simply adapt to climatic changes. One edge over some other species is that they have large paws, which helps them maintain a firm grip in the snow.

Cougars

The cougar is the second-largest cat, right after jaguars. ‘Cougar’ originated from an old South American Indian word, “cuguacuarana,” which was shortened to sugar and then to cougar. Although they appear huge and malicious, cougars are more closely related to domestic house cats in terms of their behavior.

• Characteristics: In terms of appearance, cougars have a solid body with a tawny coat, round heads, erect ears, large paws, and hind legs. Their tail length is about 1m, which is 1/3 of their total body length. They have a uniform colored coat throughout, and that’s why the species name is ‘concolor.’ Adult males weigh about 200 pounds, while adult females weigh up to 120 pounds. Due to their similar physiques, it is tough to distinguish male cougars from females. Male cougars can live up to 10-12 years in the wilderness, while female cougars live longer.
• Food Habits: Cougars are predatory, much like the other cats, and they prey on various deer species, such as the white-tailed deer, mule deer, and moose. They also hunt wild camelids and several small animals like raccoons. Cougars tend to drag their kill to a safer place, hiding it so that they can consume it even days later.
• Habitat: Cougars are reclusive and can be found in many varied habitats, including dense forests, dense underbrush, mountain ranges, steep canyons, lowlands, mountainous deserts, and open areas with little vegetation where humans cannot be found. Although they keep their distance from humans, there have been occasional cases where they may attack humans. They tend to leave behind a characteristic neck bite while attacking. Their jaw is powerful enough to grab even large prey. As with many predators, hunting cougars has become an everyday sport, and hence, many conservation efforts have been taken, such as the Texas Mountain Lion Conservation Project launched in 2009.

The Conservation Efforts Taken to Preserve Cougar/Mountain Lion

Mountain lions play an important role as top predators in the food chain, helping to control populations of ungulates. This is quite beneficial to humans. Given its widespread distribution, it is listed as a least concern species on the IUCN Red List. Scientists, however, suspect that its populations are decreasing throughout, making conservation interventions necessary to keep its populations stable.

While habitat loss and fragmentation, poaching, and legal hunting are the common threats to the puma, the multiple names of the puma are a hurdle to the various conservation efforts undertaken. Here is an estimated depiction of the Cougar range in America:

From the above context, it seems clear that there is no difference between a Cougar and a Mountain Lion. While there may be subtle differences as one transcends from one geographic location to another, they are essentially the same animal/same species.