*See's a large cat/wolf walking through property, not hurting anyone/anything. Wonders if he/she has enough gun to kill it. Makes post asking if he has enough gun to kill said creature that was just going about it's daily routine not bothering anyone/anything. Calls FWR. Gets the 'okay' on killing it.* ... Sounds legit.
Wait a minute...
FEDERAL LEGAL STATUS :
Florida panthers and eastern pumas are listed as Endangered [61].
http://www.fs.fed.us/database/feis/animals/mammal/puco/all.html
Eastern cougar - Historically eastern cougars ranged throughout the
eastern United States from Michigan and Indiana east to the Atlantic
coast, and from southern Canada south to Tennessee and South Carolina.
Today eastern cougars may be extinct. No breeding populations have been
positively identified within the historic range since the 1920's.
Unconfirmed sightings continue to be reported from the mountains of
North Carolina and the Virginias. Tracks and scat were observed in the
Jefferson-George Washington-Monongahela National Forest as recently as
1981, but no positive confirmation was made [53].
STATES :
AL AK AZ AR CA CO CT DE FL GA
ID IL IA KS KY MD MA MI MN MS
MO MT NE NV NH NJ NM NC ND OK
OR PA SC SD TN TX UT VT VA WA
WV WI WY
MANAGEMENT CONSIDERATIONS :
Hunting - One of the largest causes of mountain lion mortality is
hunting [56]. Currently almost all states and provinces that support
viable mountain lion populations provide sport hunting opportunities.
Season lengths range from 1 month to year-round and often vary within a
jurisdiction [30]. Most states allow hunters to kill only one mountain
lion per season, with the exception of Texas, which places no limit on
the number of mountain lions a hunter can take [20]. In California
mountain lion hunting has been banned since 1990 [37].
But, according to these two links;
http://www.fws.gov/northeast/ecougar/qa.html and
http://www.fws.gov/northeast/ecougar/newsreleasefinal.html - The Eastern Cougar is extinct and no longer under the protection of the Endangered Species Act.
If you ever do truly find an Eastern Cougar, or Puma Concolor, and you decide that you're gonna shoot it because the KDFWR says it's not protected, and it was just passing through not posing a real and immediate threat to you... Well, I hope you keep it a deep secret to your grave, cuz I wouldn't want to be you in that situation.
For reference sake, the "Mountain Lion" is just another name for the Puma, or Cougar, so no one get's to say "that only applies to cougars! I'm talking about mountain lions! they're different!".
*
http://www.kentuckyawake.org/Mountain_Lion
*
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cougar
And btw, I've had my own fight and fair share of battling with KDFWR call centers and "managers" who swear up and down that Open Carry is illegal on State and Federal parks and forests. So, I'd seriously take anything and everything that the KDFWR person you spoke with, and throw it out the window, because if they happily mislead people about gun rights/laws, then they're going to mislead people about protection/endangered/extinct animals, because they can get away with it.