How big cats save human lives: the predator that protects you.
Whatever name you give them, mountain lions—also known as pumas, cougars, panthers, catamounts, painters, and wildcats—benefit people greatly. Despite our fear of them, they protect us. How? By keeping deer off the roads, resulting in far fewer collisions than would otherwise occur if they weren't present. Studies show (Current Biology) that in areas where high puma populations occur, deer-vehicle collisions dropped up to 76% over 5 years. Pumas alter deer movement patterns—deer overlap less with roads in both space & time, reducing collision risk. The study parallels what occurred in Yellowstone with the reintroduction of wolves. This is known as "trophic cascade ecology." A trophic cascade is what happens when a big predator changes plant-eating animals' behavior, & that change then affects the plants that animals normally eat.
In Yellowstone, elk stopped congregating in riverbanks and valleys where wolves could ambush them after wolves were allowed back into the park in 1995. The vegetation recovered and was spared from devastation because fewer elk were eating cottonwood, willows, aspens, and saplings. In turn, this benefited insects, birds, and beavers, as well as stabilizing the riverbank. There are similarities to pumas because in both cases, predators quietly "fixed" the problem. Pumas helped with road safety & wolves helped with vegetation. Deer-vehicle collisions kill 200+ people per year in the U.S. & cost $14 billion in damages & hospital treatment, while mountain lions kill almost no one (2 deaths reported in the 2020s). So the predator humans fear is actually reducing the danger from the animal that causes real harm—deer.
