State officials have announced that the Florida panther population appears to be on the rise, according to a report by the Associated Press.
The director of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission's research institute said that recent estimates show there could be as many as 180 panthers in the wild.
The announcement was made during a board meeting on June 18.
Officials caution locals that as the panther population increases, more conflicts will occur with humans, according to a report by the Naples Daily News.
"The population increased steadily between 1995 and 2012, and the biggest thing that brought the population back is a 10 percent increase in kitten survival," said Gil McRae, director of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission's research institute, according to the paper.
The Florida panther was close to extinction back in 1994, when there were only around 20 to 30 panthers, according to AP.
The panther is still technically on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's endangered species list.
To remove the Florida panther from the threatened list, two separate populations of 240 panthers are required, according to the wildlife service's website.
Wildlife officials are currently looking into programs designed to encourage private landowners to welcome panthers on their property.
"We want to work with private landowners until panthers are seen as an asset," Conservation Commission biologist Thomas Eason said, according to the Naples Daily News. "The biology on panthers is the easy part. The hard part is how can we merge that biology with human psychology?"
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