Reproducing cougar with three kittens captured on trail camera in northern Minnesota

Researchers with the Voyageurs Wolf Project captured video of a female cougar with three kittens in northern Minnesota in late March, marking the first evidence of cougars reproducing in the state in over a century.

The trail camera video, captured on March 25 south of Voyageurs National Park, shows a cougar with three large kittens as they play and feed on a cached deer carcass.

“Looking at the footage was and still is surreal,” said Thomas Gable, project lead of the Voyageurs Wolf Project. The trail camera video was published and shared with the public on April 30.

Gable said, “We never anticipated seeing four cougars together in northern Minnesota. In total, we captured around four hours of footage of this cougar family at the kill, and it was fascinating to see and hear their interactions — the mother grooming her kittens, the kittens growling and hissing at each other. We feel incredibly fortunate we were able to capture such a wild moment in such detail.”

The Voyageurs Wolf Project operates a vast network of trail cameras throughout the over 200,000-acre national park and in surrounding areas to study wolves, predator-prey dynamics, and other wildlife species. Researchers with the organization have GPS-collared deer in the study area. Upon receiving a mortality signal from a collared deer, researchers hiked into the area to discover the carcass was buried under a pile of leaves on a hillside, a sign typically associated with felines.

“We suspected it was likely a bocat but thought, just possibly, it could be a cougar,” Voyageurs Wolf Project said in an April 30 Facebook post. Researchers then put trail cameras over the carcass, and within four hours, two cougar kittens returned. The entire family of four reunited later that evening and spent hours in front of the trail camera.

The organization has recorded footage of lone cougars eight times since 2023, but none had included footage of a reproducing cougar with kittens, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources said in an April 30 press release.

“Based on traits observed in the video, we estimate the kittens to be 7-9 months old, so born last fall,” said John Erb, research biologist with the Minnesota DNR.

Erb said, “The only other confirmed kittens in Minnesota turned out to be captive escapees and involved a female with two kittens that showed up and hung around a homeowner’s porch in 2001.”

Cougars were native to Minnesota, but there hasn’t been evidence of reproduction in the eastern Midwest for more than 100 years, until recent reports from Michigan and now Minnesota, the DNR said. However, detections of individual adult cougars, most commonly wandering males, have been reported across Minnesota and the western two-thirds of the Midwest.

Cougars can travel more than 40 miles in a day, and, to date, cougars documented in Minnesota appear to have all been transient animals from western South Dakota, North Dakota, or Nebraska.

“Although this is an important starting point for potential population establishment in Minnesota, predicting the future is extremely difficult,” Erb said. “These kittens might not survive, potentially getting killed by wolves, a male cougar, or vehicles. They may also become part of the founding catalyst for a slow but steady increase in numbers. Time will tell, but we are clearly nearing a point where the probability of a self-sustaining population has increased.”

In total, Voyageurs Wolf Project said the organization has over 7 hours of video footage of cougars. The April 30 YouTube video is 2 minutes and 38 seconds. The organization said, “We will share more footage soon!”

Cougars have been spotted on trail cameras or in-person across northern Minnesota throughout the years. A lone cougar was sighted near Duluth in December 2025 and cougars have been spotted in Cook County numerous times.

Cougars almost always tend to avoid human contact or confrontation, the DNR said. Even in states with resident populations, cougars are rarely seen. Suggestions of what to do if a person encounters a cougar are available on the Minnesota DNR website.

Cougars are protected in Minnesota, with no open harvest season. Public safety officials can lethally take a cougar if it is determined to be an immediate threat to public safety.

More information about cougars in Minnesota can be found on the Minnesota DNR website. More information about the Voyageurs Wolf Project is available at the project website.

Video of the trail camera footage from Voyageurs Wolf Project of the female cougar and three kittens below:

Kalli Hawkins April 30, 2026