MUScoop
MUScoop => The Superbar => Topic started by: Tugg Speedman on July 28, 2015, 06:26:51 AM
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Has anyone seen KenoshaWarrior recently? Just sayin.
A Creature on the Loose Puts Milwaukee Residents on Edge
The New York Times
By KAY NOLAN and JULIE BOSMAN
JULY 27, 2015
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/28/us/a-creature-on-the-loose-puts-milwaukee-residents-on-edge.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=mini-moth®ion=top-stories-below&WT.nav=top-stories-below&_r=1
(http://static01.nyt.com/images/2015/07/28/us/28milwaukee/28milwaukee-master675.jpg)
Looking for the animal on Sunday in Milwaukee as the citywide search intensified. A grainy cellphone video has given the animal a Bigfoot-like celebrity.
One man saw the creature for only a few bone-chilling seconds, but he remembers that it was big, with heavy brown fur and a long tail, and not in any particular hurry as it walked through his neighborhood in Milwaukee and then disappeared into a thickly wooded ravine.
A police officer, tracking it the next day, described it as a “catlike animal” that had successfully evaded capture again. And Annie Nolen, a resident of the Brewers Hill neighborhood who spotted the animal slinking along a fence in her backyard, said she was momentarily paralyzed by the sight.
“I couldn’t move,” Ms. Nolen told local reporters later. “I thought, what am I looking at?”
Milwaukee officials are still not sure exactly what kind of animal has been spotted for the last week wandering through densely populated areas of this city, sitting under bridges, darting down hills and casually slinking past parked cars and small bungalows.
It could be a young African lion that was purchased on the open market, kept as a pet and then released when it became too large to handle, one wildlife expert speculated. (Wisconsin state law is notably relaxed on the possession of exotic animals.) Or it could be a cougar, an animal that has been spotted more frequently in populated areas of the Midwest in recent years. The Milwaukee County Zoo announced last week that all of its lions were safe and accounted for.
Whatever it is, the Milwaukee Lion, as it is now widely known, has captivated this city of 600,000 people, who seem to be alternately amused and panic-stricken by the creature in their midst. A grainy cellphone video of the animal, taken last week, has given it a Bigfoot-like celebrity, while a citywide search has intensified and expanded, bringing together the Milwaukee Police Department, the state’s Department of Natural Resources and local wildlife officials.
The lion now has a Twitter account, @Milwaukee_Lion, and there is a hashtag devoted to it, #MKELion. (Plotting a possible escape to a rural town in the northwoods of Wisconsin, @Milwaukee_Lion tweeted: “.@Uber_WI How much to go from milwaukee to minoqua i am just wondering.”) It has been jokingly rendered in pictures, Photoshopped with a bright yellow cheesehead perched on its mane and lounging at Miller Park, watching the Brewers play baseball.
But the weeklong hunt for the creature has put some Milwaukeeans on edge. By Monday morning, the police were reporting a sighting along a quiet area of homes near the Milwaukee River. “I’m taking it very seriously,” said Jackie Bradley, a resident who said she had forbidden her three grandchildren to play outside that day. “I have a dog in the back, and I keep going back to check on him and I think I’m going to bring him in. I have a six-foot fence, but I’m worried a lion could jump the fence.”
Laura Hood and her son, Brandon Redd, scanned some nearby shrubbery for any glimpse of the animal before hurrying to their car. “I’m terrified to come out of my house,” Mr. Redd said.
Last week, one man apparently mistook a cream-colored pit bull in his neighborhood for a lion and shot it, wounding its right leg. The dog, who is named Homie and was later reunited with its owner, is expected to recover.
The Milwaukee Police Department received 14 calls throughout the weekend from residents who believed they had spotted the lion, but as of Monday evening, it was still on the loose.
According to some sightings, the animal is said to be accompanied by a smaller lion: Keimarey Evans, 14, said he was sure he saw what looked like a lion cub just a half-block from his Milwaukee home.
“I could see it peeking out of the bushes,” he said.
But some residents were skeptical. “A lion is at the top of the food chain. It’s been a week, and it hasn’t eaten yet?” said Michael Chachere, adding that there should have been sightings of droppings and dead animals, or even a missing child.
Neighborhood violence was a far greater danger than a purported lion, Mr. Chachere said.
“I think it’s a waste of city taxpayers’ money, to be honest,” he said. “That was a lot of manpower that the police used.”
Karen Sparapani, the executive director of the Milwaukee Area Domestic Animal Control Commission, said she accompanied a large police force and five state wardens on a search for the creature last weekend.
They focused their search on a ravine where the animal has been spotted by nearby residents. “Of all the places in Milwaukee it found to hide, it chose a place with fresh running water and abundant wildlife, with coyotes, rabbits and ducks,” she said.
A police officer who spotted the animal is a seasoned hunter who has visited Africa, Ms. Sparapani said, and is convinced that it is a young male African lion. “We think it’s an exotic pet that escaped its housing,” she said.
Jeff Kozlowski, owner of the Wisconsin Big Cat Rescue in Rock Springs, Wis., said that if that was the case, there was little hope of finding the person who lost control of the animal.
“If you had a pet lion and it got out and it was causing this much uproar,” he said dryly, “would you call in and say it was yours?”
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My gf is a native Californian and has only been to Milwaukee/WI once with me.
She's more into the lion sighting and updates than I am!
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(http://static01.nyt.com/images/2015/07/28/us/28milwaukee/28milwaukee-master675.jpg)
Looking for the animal on Sunday in Milwaukee as the citywide search intensified. A grainy cellphone video has given the animal a Bigfoot-like celebrity.
What color fur does this lion have?
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What color fur does this lion have?
Hilarious
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It's not a lion, it's a cougar. And there's no reason to be sheltering children unless your kids are very manly looking 18-year old boys.
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It's not a lion, it's a cougar. And there's no reason to be sheltering children unless your kids are very manly looking 18-year old boys.
Just for fun, I did a google search using the terms "cougar" and "Milwaukee."
The first link was a Yelp review of Victor's.
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What color fur does this lion have?
Sportin' hardwood floorin', hey?
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I heard it's headed north toward Mequon.
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I heard it's headed north toward Mequon.
Cougar heading back to its natural habitat.
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Strangely - and I did not know this until now - but the cougar is indeed native to Wisconsin. Why am I just learning this now?
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Strangely - and I did not know this until now - but the cougar is indeed native to Wisconsin. Why am I just learning this now?
How about the MILF? Is that also native to Wisconsin?
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Strangely - and I did not know this until now - but the cougar is indeed native to Wisconsin. Why am I just learning this now?
Well they don't meander down to the south all that often.
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Cougar heading back to its natural habitat.
Sadly, the cougar was not known to frequent the area around Marquette back in the day.
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Couldn't they bring down the tough guy Minneapolis dentist to handle this? ::)
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Couldn't they bring down the tough guy Minneapolis dentist to handle this? ::)
Guys like him find cougars to be quite evasive. Especially during alimony hearings.
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Couldn't they bring down the tough guy Minneapolis dentist to handle this? ::)
His insurer already had to pay $127,500 to a cougar/employee for sexual harassment
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FYI, city officials released a statement ordering miltown men between 20-35 to get tested for cat scratch fever.
https://www.youtube.com/v/nW8S58CYQqs
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Someone is already selling T-shirts that read "I survived the Milwaukee Lion"
(http://media.jrn.com/images/mkelion.JPG)
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Someone is already selling T-shirts that read "I survived the Milwaukee Lion"
It would be funny if a guy wearing that shirt actually ended up getting killed by the thing.
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It would be funny if a guy wearing that shirt actually ended up getting killed by the thing.
Funny...ironic...potato/potato (maybe that turn of phrase doesn't work so well in text)
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If they can just get that Lion to Lambeau, you know he will roll over and die. (spoken as a Lion fan)
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If it's either a lion or cougar that's damned serious.
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If it's either a lion or cougar that's damned serious.
I don't see how this thing will be captured alive. They said a tranquilizer would take 15 minutes to bring it down. It's a damn big cat, you just got shot with a dart and is in an urban population. If it takes one step towards an onlooker I'm commanding it to be shot. You just can't mess around with an animal that big.
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Someone is already selling T-shirts that read "I survived the Milwaukee Lion"
(http://media.jrn.com/images/mkelion.JPG)
It's quite a bit different then Rusty the Red Panda wandering around Washington DC.
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They don't like people and are pretty shy and usually nocturnal. We live among dozens here in the Santa Monicas and with the droves of people running, hiking, riding each day sighting one is a rare occurrence. Nobody has been attacked here in 30 years. They will go ever the wall with your 110 lb Akita though. They might pass through Mequon because all the purse sized dogs are just a snack.
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I don't know man, in that video it was strutting like it owned the city.
Need to catch that thing so it's the mascot when the Milwaukee Bucks go to Milwaukee Cougars.
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FYI, city officials released a statement ordering miltown men between 20-35 to get tested for cat scratch fever.
https://www.youtube.com/v/nW8S58CYQqs
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Cougar heading back to its natural habitat.
(http://i1250.photobucket.com/albums/hh524/Dadnatron/Cougars.jpg)