Unfortunately, a woman hiking alone was killed today by a mountain lion just above our ranch on Crosier Mountain in GMU20. We were preparing for our upcoming late season January bull elk hunts that start on Saturday when we heard the news. You can Google and read about the tragedy. CPW Officers responded by helicopter, on foot and with hounds. Two mountain lions were killed. It is CPW policy to kill any animal that attacks or kills a human.
We see lots of tracks in this area and we have taken several mountain lions off our ranch and Crosier Mountain. It’s a giant roadless ridge that extends several miles and is only accessible by foot or horseback. When the weather is mild, as it is this winter, the area is popular with hikers.
We lived in Pilot Hill, CA for several years and a female jogger was killed by a mountain lion in nearby Cool CA, a predatory attack. This occurred before we lived there but it did cross my mind while jogging from our home to Cronan Ranch and back, sometimes I had that feeling I was being watched. They are an excellent ambush predator, capable of taking down a bull elk, always going for the neck, severing the spine or suffocation as their primary method of killing prey. That’s how the female jogger from Cool, CA was killed.
I wonder if she was menstruating and the female from Colorado too? They are drawn to the smell of blood I believe. I used to predator hunt there and called in a big tom mountain lion with a distressed fawn call while bobcat hunting, of course mountain lions are protected in CA (for no reason, they aren’t endangered). Now bobcat hunting is banned there too for no reason either. Many years later 2 teenage boys were attacked and one was killed recently in nearby Georgetown while shed hunting.
We later lived in North Western Montana for 4 years and I encountered several more mountain lions while hunting, one stayed hidden about 12 yards away while I was unlocking then closing a forest service gate in the dark and he didn’t reveal himself until I got back in my rig to drive away and he sauntered across right in front of the truck! I had access to that gate to hunt a friends property and after that incident I had my hand on my Glock 10mm, rapidly scanning the area with a flashlight for the following few times I had to open and close that gate in the dark, then I stopped worrying about it after awhile.
Based on my own cursory research it seems that the rare mountain lion attacks are mostly either an older one maybe with diminished hunting abilities, injured or crippled or a younger one that didn’t complete it’s training with the mother who may have been killed, they do stay with the mom learning hunting skills for up to 2 years that’s why 2,3 or 4 adult appearing mountain lions may be seen hunting together. A large solitary tom has a huge range and will always hunt alone and won’t tolerate another adult male in its range.
Really a beautiful and powerful animal, but attacks on people are still very rare. If they had the temperament of a leopard they’d definitely rack up a higher body count but they don’t. I do know this, if a full grown healthy adult mountain lion was stalking you, you probably wouldn’t know it, they are one of the stealthiest predators in North America.
Trail cam pic of 3 mountain lions behind our cabin in Montana, an adult female and her 2 large juveniles. There’s probably a fourth large juvenile somewhere in there too.
