Animal That Disappeared 200 Years Ago Spotted on Side of the Road

A carnivore that was hunted to near extinction in the 1800s was possibly spotted dead on the side of the road in Ohio over the weekend.

Fishers are North American mammals in the weasel family that resemble a large mink. Considered “active predators,” fishers hunt in trees, often going after rodents, but they also consume fruits and nuts. They are one of the few species that can kill a porcupine. The species isn’t endangered, but it has been hunted to extinction in some parts of the United States, including in Ohio.

However, what appeared to be a fisher was discovered as roadkill near Kent State University on Sunday. The Ohio Department of Natural Resources (DNR) is conducting a necropsy—or animal autopsy—on the animal. If confirmed as a fisher, it would be the farthest west in Ohio one has been spotted in 200 years.

Newsweek reached out to the Ohio Department of Natural Resources via email for comment.

Since the fishers largely disappeared, 40 confirmed sightings have occurred in northeast Ohio, according to a report by the Akron Beacon Journal. More than half of the sightings occurred in the past three years as the animals move westward from Pennsylvania and into Ohio.

One of the fishers recently spotted as roadkill was pregnant, signaling that the species is returning to Ohio.

“I think it’s great that we’re starting to see them more and more and get more reports of them in Ohio,” Laurie Brown, a wildlife research technician with the Division of Wildlife, told the Akron Beacon Journal.

Fishers could be expanding into Ohio after Pennsylvania conducted a reintroduction program for the species.

Fishers have populated Pennsylvania to the point that state officials now permit a fisher trapping season while conducting a management plan to ensure the animals remain in the state.

“Pennsylvania’s present day fisher population is the direct result of natural expansion from adjacent states and from reintroduction programs here. In 1969, West Virginia reintroduced 23 fisher obtained from New Hampshire. Fisher populations in West Virginia have since expanded throughout that state and into western Maryland, northern Virginia, and southwestern Pennsylvania,” a Pennsylvania website dedicated to the species said.

New York also transferred fishers from the Adirondack Mountains into the Catskills region in 1979, the website said. Some Pennsylvania fisher populations could have migrated to the state from New York.

However, Pennsylvania also introduced nearly 200 fishers of its own into the state across six sites in northern Pennsylvania.

Fishers are most often found throughout New England, Tennessee, the northern Great Lake states, the northern Rockies, and some West Coast populations.