Well, you answered your own question. Where there exists minimal habitat we would assume that there wouldn't be a breeding population but possibly a transient animal or a few animals moving through. These things have a way of becoming apparent if there is indeed a breeding population. A cat would get hit by a car or someone would tree a cat or some other suchinstance would occur. I'm the first to admit thatlack of evidence doesn't mean they aren't there but until we know for sure, we use the best information available to make management decisions.

Also, sightings and other types of subjective evidence are not used in making management decisions. If Joe-bob thinks he sees a cougar, we can't go spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to look at cougars in an area just because he thinks he saw one. That would be irresponsible, we are after all, public servants first. Sightings like that have a nasty tendency to get out of hand and therefore are not considered reliable evidence (see Bigfoot).

"The scientific community has developed a reputation over the past 20-30 years for being inaccurate, deceitful and down right dishonest when things come up that they have no easy answers for."

Well if your going to fire off a rediculous statement like that I suggest being prepared to back it up with verifiable facts and case studies where you can objectively prove your statement. Funny how those "scientific" things like logic, objectiveness, and fact keep popping up. Hrrm could this be how logical people seek out truth? Gee, I guess it's possible...