The Illinois Department of Natural Resources is investigating after a cougar was spotted and killed on a northwest Illinois farm about 130 miles west of Chicago.
The IDNR said a conservation police officer was called to a farm in Morrison, Ill. Wednesday around 2 p.m. after property owners spotted the large cat running from a corn field and toward a farmhouse, NBC 6 reports.
The property owner requested the animal be euthanized, according to NBC, and after consulting with IDNR officials and wildlife personnel, the cougar was shot with a rifle.
Before it was put down, the cougar was found hiding in a concrete tunnel under a corn crib. Wildlife biologists will perform a necropsy on the cougar, but officials initially believe the cougar weighed more than 100 pounds and was nearly 6 feet long.
The cougar was shot and killed on a farm in Morrison, Ill., -- about 130 miles west of Chicago -- on Wednesday.
The last time a cougar was confirmed spotted in Illinois was in 2008 when the Tribune reports a male cougar was shot and killed on Chicago's North Side.
According to United Press International, there have been a total of three confirmed cougar sightings in Illinois since 2002 noting the state has been "mostly cougar-free since at least 1870."