Mountain lion travels a record-setting 1,500 miles only to be run over in Connecticut

news.yahoo.com...

BOSTON (Reuters) - A mountain lion killed on a Connecticut highway in June was a wild animal from South Dakota that prowled more than 1,500 miles eastward before meeting his death 70 miles from New York City, genetic tests confirmed this week.

The big cat with a long tail and an even longer tale was determined to have travelled through Minnesota and Wisconsin in late 2009 and 2010 before arriving in the posh suburb of Greenwich, Connecticut, according to DNA testing of the animal and his scat.

The cross-country trek is one of the longest movements on record for a land mammal and nearly doubles any known distance traveled by a mountain lion, according to Connecticut environmental officials. It's also the first recorded confirmation of a wild mountain lion in Connecticut in more than 100 years, officials said.

1,500 miles! Wow! There was another article somewhere that said the mountain lion traveled atleast 2,000 miles but I cant find that one at the moment.

This cat goes in to one of my animal kingdom heroes. Plus, he managed to fight off (maybe even eat) a porcupine along the way.

Other signs that he was a wild animal included the fact he was not declawed, neutered or implanted with a microchip but did have porcupine quills embedded in his tissues.

Sad that his/her journey ended the way it did.