Posted on 01/26/2007 8:04:16 AM PST by rface
A woman saved her husband’s life by clubbing a mountain lion that attacked him while the couple were hiking in a California state park.
Jim and Nell Hamm, who will celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary next month, were in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park when the lion pounced.
“He didn’t scream. It was a different, horrible plea for help, and I turned around, and by then the cat had wrestled Jim to the ground,” Mrs Hamm said from the hospital where her husband was recovering from a torn scalp, puncture wounds and other injuries.
After the attack, game wardens closed the park, about 320 miles north of San Francisco, and released dogs to track the lion. They later shot a pair of lions found near the trail where the attack happened.
The carcasses were flown to a state forensics lab to determine if either animal mauled the man.
Although the Hamms were experienced hikers, neither had seen a mountain lion before Mr Hamm, 70, was mauled, his wife said.
Mrs Hamm said she grabbed a four-inch-wide log and beat the animal with it, but it would not release its hold on her husband’s head.
“Jim was talking to me all through this, and he said, ’I’ve got a pen in my pocket and get the pen and jab him in the eye’,” she said. “So I got the pen and tried to put it in his eye, but it didn’t want to go in as easy as I thought it would.”
When the pen bent and became useless, Mrs Hamm went back to using the log. The lion eventually let go and, with blood on its nose, stood staring at her. She screamed and waved the log until the animal left.
“She saved his life, there is no doubt about it,” said Steve Martarano, a spokesman for the Department of Fish and Game.
Mrs Hamm, 65, said she was scared to leave her dazed and bleeding husband alone, so the couple walked a quarter of a mile to a trail head, where she gathered branches to protect them if more lions came. They waited until a ranger came and summoned help.
“My concern was to get Jim out of there,” she said. “I told him, ’Get up, get up, walk’, and he did.”
Mr Hamm was said to be in a fair condition today. He had to have his lips stitched back together and underwent surgery for lacerations on his head and body.
I suppose you could start here:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/01/12/ap/politics/mainD8MJEK380.shtml
Then do a Google using keywords... Giuliani anti gun and then spend the rest of the afternoon & evening reading about his anti-gun platform.
Your move.........
This is another mess that got started during the Clintoon years, the liberal love of predators. That insane love made these killers protected and without anything to control their population.
I never saw a cougar or even fresh tracks until the mid 1990's after it became against the law to hunt cougars in California and Oregon.
Besides sightings in the daylight with no fear on the part of the cougars, a more dangerous non sighting event became common place with many of us who fished in the back country and even a short distance off the road.
That was finding fresh cougar tracks over our tracks when we returned to our vehicles. This was scary enough during the day, but when cougar tracks were seen over our tracks after or at about sunset it was very scary.
I stopped this practice after returning to my vehicle after dark in the Sierras one warm summer evening. A mother cougar and her two big descendants had left tracks all over my tracks for about a mile.
When will the idiots learn they are the top predator in the food chain - when not hunted. Many of the ones I have seen in the last few years are gaunt and skinny - very hungry. Also young that are having trouble hunting take anything they can get.
I expect that grizzlies will be reintroduced to Central Valley any day now. /s
Follow up story from todays paper... http://www.times-standard.com/local/ci_5100552
Now how is it that I just knew it was the female?
:)
consequences of socialized game management
It's time to repeal the Kitty Protection Initiative and reinstate lion season.
Officials in California think they've identified the mountain lion that attacked a 70-year-old hiker Wednesday.
A female mountain lion shot by game wardens at a state park had human blood in her claws...
Then gun control and hunting restrictions came to California
Hiking in the Cascades, I knew that there were mountain lions, although I never encountered any.
Hamm's wife, Nell, 65, smashed the cat in the snout with a large branch and stabbed it with a pen to fend off the attack...
Yes a woman hiker was eaten by a bear here in 2000. Plus, two attacks in the past two years here in the Smokies -- in one a young child was killed, and in the other an elderly woman was attacked on her porch this past fall.
These attacks were predicted back in the 1990s when they outlawed hunting them there, and the use of hounds to hunt them in several western states.
They are losing the fear of humans.
Don't have time to post it right now George, but go to www.outdoorpressroom to see an interesting story about a lynx that traveled from Colorado and was caught in Wyoming eating someone's chickens.
Just goes to show, it isn't always strength (or preparation) that wins the day. She clubbed the cat to attention and he decided to take his business elsewhere.
Old man probably too chewy anyhow.
Pigs are dangerous preditors and much smarter than cats. I would have been scared too.
They're deadly and predisposed to it too.
That's why I carry my .44 Mag when hiking in the local area. It's quicker to grab than a branch and pen.
I often turn around when I am hiking.
No telling what maybe behind us on the trail.
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.