Posted on 03/17/2024 1:26:43 PM PDT by ProtectOurFreedom
Five competitive cyclists – women in their 50s and 60s – met at the Tokul Creek trail north of Snoqualmie.
At the yellow gate before riding into the deep forest, the women took a group selfie. They had no premonition that 19 miles in, a young male cougar would attack one of them, and that they’d spend 45 minutes in a battle for their lives.
The first cougar, presumably the mother or a sibling, ran off. But the younger one paused … and then lunged at Keri Bergere, 60, who was biking a few paces ahead of him.
“Looking to my right, I saw the cougar’s face,” Bergere said. “It was just a split second, and he tackled me off my bike.”
Bergere and the cougar tumbled into a shallow ditch to the side of the trail. The animal sunk his teeth into Bergere’s jaw and pinned her face into the dirt.
“I thought my teeth were coming loose, and I was gonna swallow my teeth,” she said. “I could feel the bones crushing, and I could feel it tearing back.”
The cougar ripped an earring out of her ear, while maintaining a vice grip on her.
“These ladies are not big, and they were killing this cougar,” Bergere said. “They were not going to let it get me.”
Fight, flight, or freeze, they say, and these women fought. One had a two-inch knife and used it to stab the wild cat – to little avail.
Cyclist Annie Bilotta, 64, tried to choke the cat.
(Excerpt) Read more at kuow.org ...
”signs, signs, everywhere a sign”...
Yeah, they clog up the scenery and break my mind... ;-)
Fifty- and sixty-year old women riding bikes on a forest trail.
Where I come from (western Washington state, a few-score miles south of this episode), we call such women “bait”. Glad they all lived to talk about it. There was a young couple near Evaro, MT, who lost their 5-year old son to a cougar while they were in the house and the kid was out playing by himself in their fenced-in back yard. Mountain lions make better rugs than neighbors.
Timothy Treadwell
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Treadwell
A search for *eaten alive by grizzly bears*
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=eaten+alive+by+grizzlies&t=brave&pn=3&ia=web
I heard about Timothy Treadwell, but didn’t realize there were so many other attacks caught on camera.
They’re spooky, blend right in like rattlesnakes and won’t move. There have been incidents where people are taking pics, selfies etc, and long after taking the shot someone finally noticed there was a mountain lion starring right at the camera from the underbrush.
Good stuff, huh?
They suggested catching the oil in a hub cab. That won’t work today!
LOL...I read them, then I head out anyway. Call me stupid.
I sometimes misjudge a hike and find myself hiking back at dusk with five miles to go. I start “singing,” shouting, clapping hands, saying “Look out cats, here I come”.
Scary times.
“If he’s surreptitiously stalking you”
And that’s what the big cats always do. They can follow you unseen for LONG distances, totally silent.
“Mountain lions make better rugs than neighbors.”
That’s why out ancestors exterminated pumas and wolves.
Yes, even an 11-oz .22 magnum revolver would have been useful. Kudos to these ladies for taking care of business... Someone was looking out for them, whether they understand that or not.
A 22-oz model 60 loaded with whatever the max load is for the owner - most choose .38 plus-p’s, might have even had a desirable DRT effect on Mr. Cougar.
Anyway one hopes that this experience helps these nice liberal ladies... Yes, of course they are... To reconsider their liberal positions on firearms.
(Or a Glock 48 or whatever, if one is into bottom-feeders...)
That’s a very small mountain lion.
It’s a one year old juvenile.
“One had a two-inch knife”
Roman sword fighting dictum was, “ONE INCH IN THE RIGHT PLACE IS SUFFICIENT.”
I was caught one time with no better tool at hand than a Swiss Army key ring knife with an 1-1/2” blade. (I was riding my bike when I came upon some nice little old lady who had just wrecked her car on a large deer, but hadn’t killed it. Calmed her down and asked if she was armed, handgun? rifle? piano wire? Looked through her trunk. Shovel was the best I could come up with. Not this week! The deer was clawing to get away, but only with it’s front legs, the rear legs were inert. Obvious broken spine. Then I remembered the key ring knife...I keep all my knives as sharp as I can, but rough sharp, not razor (worked rope for a long time and that edge was best for that...best for butchering, too, imho). I told her to get behind me, that blood was going to spurt. I grabbed the deer under the chin, pulled its head back (it was was weak) inserted the blade well before where I figured the carotid arteries were, put my index on the back of that small blade, and effortlessly drew the knife back. Blood squirted out 8-12’ in distinct strong pulses, then 8-10’, 8’, 6’, 4’, 2’, a dribble, then dead. Whole thing was over in less than 30 seconds.
I was amazed. Now this was maybe 35 years ago so don’t hold me close on #’s.
Then I heard her say, “Can ya help me get ‘er into the trunk?”
JUST KIDDING.
If the woman with the 2” knife had known where to put it, and had the rocks to try it, that cat would have been dead before anyone had known it. If you don’t know where to put it a 6”, 9”, 12” blade, EXCALIBUR! won’t do you any good.
Now, a .357, or 44.magnum, or a host of other handgun calibers would do ya just fine, but again, in THE RIGHT SPOT!!! (But NOT the .50Cal AE ‘cause ya only get one shot! After that first shot ya’d rather be eaten than pull that trigger again!)
KEEP THE FAITH
How hard is it to find the right spot with a 2” blade when the animal is attacking? Very. Two inches will just barely penetrate the skin layer. For a human, you need at least 3” to reach a vital organ. Better to have at least one inch over that.
We all forget to be careful sometimes...
A couple of years ago I went walking on a foggy Saturday morning-it had rained the night before so the woods were quiet and everything smelled like the wet cedar trees-really nice so I wasn’t paying attention like I should have been-until I got that feeling of being watched and i stopped to look around-there were fresh mountain lion tracks going across the trail right in front of me. I said oh,s***, started backing out of the trail, waving my stick-and the only song that came to mind was ACDC’s “Dirty Deeds”, so I sang it as loud as I could. After I got home, I realized that anyone else walking in the woods would have heard me and thought there was a crazy person out there...
A .45ACP would’ve been a lot better than fighting for 45 minutes.
CC
Yikes!
I have a Glock 20 loaded with Buffalo Bore 220 gr for my backwoods adventures. I’m escalating to deadly force immediately in a situation like this.
Trying to imagine the poor woman with that attached to her face.
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