TG I just did a research paper on this. I'm not going to claim it is perfect, and I did not address what I believe the population to be. To answer your question honestly don't know. I only hunt a small portion of northern Utah. But that being said my father in law used to cut several fresh lion tracks a day in one particular canyon. At one time he cut 7 different lion tracks. This was a decade ago. The harvest data shows that more tags are being issued less lions are being treed, and the average age harvested is on a decline. To me that says we are killing them off rather than maintaining a managable level. Now that being said I do not want to cut 7 lion tracks in that canyon. A decade ago my father in law knew the lions where overpopulated in that area and the deer herds were locally suffering. Now lions have been killed back all over the state according to harvest data. So efforts should be put where it needs to be. I talk a little about my opinion on what is causing decline in deer herds. I'll post it up later, I can't wait for that conversation....