Mountain Lions: Attack Man, Eat Human, Attack Dogs, Unafraid

Mountain lion populations are on the increase and pose significant threats to unarmed humans. Mountain lions were involved in a flurry of interaction with humans in the last two weeks of 2019.

On 26 December 2019, Gary Gorney was hunting pheasants with his two dogs, in the Custer Mine hunting area near Minot, North Dakota. His dogs alerted him to something ahead. Instead of a pheasant, a large female mountain lion charged him out of the grass. He shot and killed the lion with his 9mm pistol.

Minot dailynews.com:

Gorney said he was talking on his cell phone when his German shorthair, Milly, went on point. He put the cell phone in his pocket with the expectation that a rooster pheasant was about to take flight. Instead, a large female mountain lion emerged from the tall grass and came right at him.

“I dropped my dad’s 100-year-old double-barrel, I don’t even remember doing that, and went for the sidearm that I carry with me underneath my jacket,” said Gorney. “My instincts as a military law enforcement officer took over. There was no thought process. It was self-defense.”
The mountain lion was within 10 feet of Gorney when it was hit by a bullet from Gorney’s 9-millimeter handgun.

On the last day of the year, in 2019, near the Pine Canyon trailhead, a few miles Northeast of Tucson, Arizona, Pima County Sheriff deputies discovered three mountain lions were feeding on a human body. The three lions were unafraid of people. The lions did not flee as officers approached. They were feeding on the body within sight of human homes. From kold.com:

Similar thoughts.

The shotgun could have been broken open or even unloaded.

Being an former LEO he defaulted to his training.

I have 26 acres in woods on a small river in north Alabama. We have seen mountain lions on my property. A lady up the hill has seen a bear on her property. We also have deer and wild hogs. You don’t go walking in the woods without a baseball bat or a gun going with you, especially about dusk . . . that is when the cats come out.

I am only 8 miles out from a town of 10,000 and the rural areas around me are somewhat thickly settled. But that small river is mostly bounded by hills and bluffs, making a wooded corridor along its path that provides good cover for larger animals.

Here in South Alabama, I talk to a bunch of older folks who insists panthers are still out there in our woods, black panthers and mountain lion panthers. First, there are no known melanistic cougars in North America. Jaguars, yes, but not pumas I don’t know why so many insist they saw a black panther but they do.

I suppose any particular panther showing up where I live is possibly from Florida. It’s unbelievable how far a young puma can roam. One was shot at West Point, Georgia, which is Northeast of where I live, and it was confirmed through DNA to be an endangered Florida Panther (which is still the species puma concolor).

Anyway, I used to think it would be cool to have panthers back in the woods here again, but now I’m pretty sure they can stay away. Sometimes it’s hot outside and I don’t work clothed except for shorts, and I’d to have to carry all the time, especially in those conditions.

I am outside almost everyday, in my fields and woods. I’ve been working with trees from my woods in my sawmill, so I go out daily.

I just ask for anyone in Alabama who has seen a cougar, please take a picture. I have game cameras throughout my woods, and I have lots of photos of deer, raccoons, possums, coyotes, foxes, armadillos, skunks, weasels and birds of all kinds, from buzzards to turkeys all they way down to hummingbirds, but no panthers. Nor have I seen any Alabama based game cameras showing them either.

Don’t know about going for a handgun when you could belt kitty with over 2 ounces of #6 shot.

I was thinking the same thing. I guess instincts take over and he was probably much more comfortable with the pistol. The 9 mm was obviously sufficient but at 10 feet, I'd rather have two shotgun blasts even if it is bird shot.

I shot a standing grouse once at about 10 feet with a 12 gauge with 7 1/2 shot. (I had no opportunity to get any further back.) Knowing that I was way too close I deliberately aimed low so as to not pulverize the breast. When I picked it up, only the head and breast remained and the rest of the grouse was literally gone. There might have been 1 or 2 BBs in the breast and I'm not doing justice to how thoroughly the shotgun removed everything south of the breast. It was as cleanly removed as if a surgeon had removed it with a scalpel. Had that been a cougar's head, there would have been a hole you could have put your fist in.

I have to say that I, for one, am glad these predators are making a comeback. That there is conflict at the interface of the exburbs and the country is to be expected. That there are predators deeper in the wild country is also expected.

I am frequently in the country and backpack in the wilderness. I have become more cautious and always carry. Still, I am pleased that the populations of these animals are recovering and would hate to see policies to intentionally eliminate these from the wildlands in favor of mobile home parks and vacation homes.

I do need to post some game cameras. I’m just a very busy guy with other priorities, but won’t go into all that right now. My son has actually had multiple visual encounters, almost always around dusk. I heard one late one afternoon that seemed to be a couple of hundred yards away up the hill from my house. It was unmistakably a cat semi-growl/snarl, but resonated so deeply that the sound carried very clearly to where I was . . . a bobcat or house cat could not have made that sound. A hunter friend whose property joins ours says that a game warden has confirmed to him that a breeding pair ranges along that river. They just keep it quiet in an effort to protect them.

The increase of mountain lions is a direct result of an increase in deer populations.

Locally we have no mountain lions observed to be predators on the deer hordes eating our shrubs, flowers and vegetables but coyotes have been observed chasing the numerous fawns.

First off, I’m not calling you or anyone a liar.

I farm out my land to friends who are hunters. I’d hate to see a reduction in my fabulous deer population. I have some especially large bucks and does this year.

But I do have concerns. Now I’m way South of you, between Montgomery and Auburn. I taught computers at Auburn University for 20 years. Friends of mine who teach forestry management and are no BS conservative types tell me there is no evidence of panthers surviving in Alabama, but they would LOVE to see any photos or DNA evidence to prove it. They’re like Agent Mulder, they WANT to believe.

If you ever do get some photos, please contact me, and I’ll pass them to the scientist type at AU.

Either humans have to restrain their own extensions of human development, or expect more of this.

Large predators have always had “local areas” much larger than what humans would call a “local area”. They travel and hunt across distances greater than most people travel in a day. As human civilization creeps, in fingers of development, ever so little each time into formally unoccupied areas humans cannot seem to acknowledge those areas have been occupied for ages, by large carnivorous predators.

Then you have another factor as a result of human development - the shrinkage of the food sources of the large predators. From that cause, predators like the mountain lion have had to extend their food-source territory, and again bringing them into contact with humans.

Corner a wild animal - even just corner it territorially - and it will react as any living thing does when it is desperate; taking risks more aggressively.

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