Posted on 02/02/2014 2:27:26 PM PST by jazusamo
Traps have been put in place to capture the lion
Authorities are hoping to speak Sunday to a 50-year-old homeless man who suffered severe injuries in an apparent mountain lion attack in Perris.
An emergency call was placed around 8 a.m. Saturday morning of a man suffering injuries to his face, chest, head and arms, according to Dan Sforza, assistant chief of the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.
The man, who was injured near a makeshift shelter near Highway 74 and Navajo Road, was taken to a hospital where he underwent surgery, Sforza said.
(Excerpt) Read more at nbclosangeles.com ...
Knarfster, it is Monday morning here, and I am watching the Super Bowl live. It is 8 to 0 right now. We don’t see the same commercials you do. EVERYTIME there is a commercial break so far, they have this ridiculous global warming commercial, I mean EVERYTIME. What a bunch of lemmings.
They can not see what caused the injuries to his face, chest, head and arms ? Hint : large teeth and claw marks ?
How about tracks nearby ?
or hair, blood, etc. left behind ?
Must be chair sitters who never gets out of the office.
Exactly...The powers that be seem to be intentionally not saying much about this, hopefully more will be said when he can talk.
In one other article I read it did say he suffered punctures at the base of his skull so it didn’t take a genius to figure out it was a mountain lion attack.
That reminded me of a post I made some months ago, noting that I have a second home in another state in a locale where there have been reports of cougar sightings. One Freeper advised that these cats prefer to wait in the lower limbs of a tree and then as you walk under it, leap onto you and start clawing and biting at your face. The Freeper then helpfully suggested that while the cat is doing this, you reach for your gun and blast it.
OK, got that. While my face is being ripped apart I calmly and methodically draw my gun and--yep, got it.
We’ve sighted mountain lions much more frequently around my place. Daytime sightings have been increasingly more common for a couple of years. I don’t know why, but they are multiplying. And as they become more numerous, they’re more aggressive and reluctant to leave.
The predator populations are expanding all over ?
We are no longer on the top of that food chain. Pets, children and smaller adults will be next.
They usually try to strike the back of the neck after running at high speed and leaping from the ground. A typical adult mountain lion is capable of jumping over the back of a running elk from behind and breaking its neck in one bite. The best defense for a human being is awareness, carrying a light and being able to quickly and accurately point shoot with a pistol.
That said, mountain lions attack pet dogs and livestock more often than people (something not so often seen in the news). Maybe they don’t quite know how to attack human beings. Not sure about that one.
Another thing: people don’t hear them growling much (or “screaming like a woman”), as is heard from movies and told in tales. They do make other sounds but not very often around the houses of people. They most often make a very quick/short screeching or squawking noise and repeat it quite a few times—not a very high pitched noise but not low pitched, either. They sound more like some kind of bird, more like a crow than anything else that I know of.
I’ve heard them making that noise many nights over the years and have seen them with lights a few times, when they made it. Haven’t heard them make any noise at all when sighted during the day. When sighted during the day, they just walk along in a leisurely way (sometimes calmly walking faster than a person can run). When they’re stalking without having been seen first at night, they’re silent, of course.
They’re expanding up the hill from you for sure. I’ll send a PM.
Thanks for the post. Interesting info.
The only thing that I would take issue with is this, and it may not be accurate since a lot of time has gone by, but I seem to have a sharp recollection of it. When out coon hunting with my grandfather back in the late 40s I remember hearing this horrible screech (or scream) from a ledge up above us and I asked Grandpa, “What’s that?” and he said it was a mountain lion but not to worry since we had lots of dogs with us.
Oh, I should add that it was nighttime.
The sounds they make might have something to do with various situations. They do make a higher pitched scream of longer duration somewhat like a woman opera singer, but I’ve only heard that one in sound files—not in person. In person, I’ve only heard the quick, lower pitched, hoarse sounding screeches, when they were prowling around in nearby fields at night.
By the way, I wrote “crow” earlier. Folks around here correct me with the name, raven, for those bigger birds. What I’ve heard from mountain lions was much quicker, coarse sounding, forced sounding (like they exhaled a lot to make the sound) and more high pitched than a raven but not like a woman opera singer issuing a long, high note.
Could be that I’m lacking good comparisons for a description, too. Maybe a recording would help, and I’ll try to remember that the next time the big cats come around.
We have them come through the ranch from time to time, got one of them about 10 years ago. Seen one last summer but I didn’t have enough time to get a shot off. He was a yearling male about 75 to 80 lbs. The Aoudad sheep have moved back on to the ranch so I suspect we’ll be seeing more. Aoudads like the mountains and so do the big cat’s. Heard one scream one night when the wife and I were fishing one of the big ponds, my first reponse was that’s a female and she’s in heat. Anybody thats ever had a female house cat go into heat knows what I’m taking about. Our cats don’t get as big as the northern cat’s, a big male might go 135 to 150 lbs. Didn’t weigh the one I shot but I guessed him at about 100 lbs.
Keep in touch. I find this to be a fascinating subject.
mountain lion prefers free-range humans
“OK, got that. While my face is being ripped apart I calmly and methodically draw my gun and—yep, got it.”
Hopefully, you will be in shock for the first few seconds - long enough to draw, push the muzzle against fur and fire repeatedly.
The reason they go for face bites is their lips close off any breathing by you while they can breath through their nose.
Shoot rapidly, before a lack of air and cat breath causes you to black out.
Remember: MAULED IS BETTER THAN EATEN.
Thank you for the insights. I’ll look into the predation regulations for protecting livestock, and see what I can do, too. I don’t know that they’ll be any problem after we finish the fencing, corral, squeeze chute and get some yaks, though. Yaks tend to be aggressive against predators.
Regular cattle require too much hay (more expensive to transport from hay country up to this part of the Rockies). It’s too cold and windy here for cattle (-30s, gusts up to 110 mph or so), and the ice gets too deep. With new laws and much of the CO population being from the northeast and west coast, even open range grazing for larger herds is going away.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.