If you spot a cougar don't run whatever you do. Yea, sure. I don't think my legs would cooperate

[NNN0LHI]

http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/896894,CST-NWS-cougar16.article

Cougar 'looks at us as food'

COUGAR KILLED | Cops, mayor defend shooting as experts try to find how predator got here

Cat steps: What to do if sighted by a cougar

"First thing you should know: Never turn your back on a cat," said Bruce Patterson, curator of mammals at the Field Museum, who has made about 30 trips to work with lions in Africa.

"Then look big. Never look inattentive or move the other way."

So it's a stand-off?

"Then you have a chance to think, and hopefully somebody will come by," Patterson said. "If you have to move, backing away slowly and deliberately is the way to do it. And you need to be prepared to fight back."

There's good cause for these cautious tactics.

"Their leaps are incredible, 15 feet at a bound," Patterson said. "Their closing speed is so much faster than anything you could muster to get away."


I read today in the Sun-Times that one of them can bite an adults arm off in one bite. Whoa dude!

"Then you have a chance to think..." Yea, think about meeting your maker.

[DS1]

1. Bite your whole arm off? What does it think it is?

[flvegan]

2. "...and hopefully somebody will come by"

And then if you run faster than they can, you're safe. Might be worth a quick kick in the groin for extra advantage.





What?

[TZ]

3. *snort*

Survival of the swiftest....

[LeftyMom]

5. "Always swim with a buddy. That way you don't have to be faster than the shark,

you just have to be faster than your buddy."

Seriesly, this is ass-covering scare mongering. We have a fuckton of mountain lions around here, because they're a protected species. There are plenty on our riverside bike trail, so people run, cycle and walk through their territory all day long. And NOTHING happens. They eat deer. People don't look, smell or move like deer, so they don't see people as potential prey. Mountain lions are very timid around people.

[Deep13]

9. Yes, they're timid unless they are starving.

When I was hiking in Washington a few years ago, we were warned that mountain lion attacks were on the rise and that habitat destruction (that is, a lack of hunting grounds) was the cause.

And a person's first warning is usually the brief glimpse of fur just below eye level before he or she sinks into unconsciousness.

[LeftyMom]

12. We have a ton of habitat loss here, and droughts and shit.

Lots of subdivisions in mountain lion habitat, people recreating in mountain lion habitat, etc. If mountain lions were dangerous, we'd have a fuck of a lot of mountain lion attacks.

Mountain lion deaths in California in the past hundred years: 2-5, depending on whether you want to count one case where there's some debate about whether the guy was attacked and died or had a heart attack while cycling and was scavenged after the fact, and two cases from 1909 where the attacks were survived but death followed due to rabies. Only two are definite mountain lion kills, out of how many millions of people living or recreating routinely in mountain lion territory?

[truedelphi]

14. Also I have been told that sometimes the warning is a short husky "cough cough"

A sound which to me registers every time my stomach growls.

this info comes from neighbors who have spotted the animals over the past few years.

I have given up jogging as here in the foothills, cougars are not uncommon. And my stomach growling makes me think they have me!

[Madrone]

4. This is a subject near and dear to me....

I hike a lot, and I live in cougar country. The big kitties scare the CRAP out of me. If you SEE one of those bastards you're quite lucky - usually the first indication there's one around will be feeling it jump on your back and sink their teeth into your neck. :scared:

[XemaSab]

8. EXACTLY

I watched a necropsy on one once.... If they want to kill and eat you, there's not a lot you can really do about it.

I've only seen one in the wild once, and that was a very special experience that I may have again some day, but hopefully not with me as food. But this guy was trying to get the hell away from us. :P

[RadiationTherapy]

6. Run!? We don't run. We don't fall! WE FIGHT!

FOR THIS

IS

SPAAARRTAAAAAAAA!

[XemaSab]

7. Cougars scare the shit out of me

We don't have grizzlies in California, but coyotes, deer, bears, elk... all the other big animals here don't really scare me.

Cougars... dude... :scared:

[hunter]

15. I'll second that.

Bears are worrisome, but I've surprised them and survived. The coyotes in most places will simply size you up and look annoyed, unless you are in a place where people shoot them, in which case you won't see them at all.

But cougars, which I've only seen far away except in zoos, have an expression of "I could kill you."

[AngryAmish]

10. Let the cougars pay the cougar tax

[KG]

11. i never ran from cougars, i always bought them drinks!

[unpossibles]

13. as a long-time cat person, this makes sense

my cats go for movement, and if they want to be 'invisible' around the dog, they walk in slow motion.

[guitar man]

16. of course not

When I see a cougar, I pop a breath mint and try to be as sexy as I can, maybe she'll come talk to me then :evilgrin:

[begin_within]

17. This is why everyone should carry an air horn, or a pack of firecrackers.