The discovery of an old mountain lion kill has been made just 6 feet from the nature trail I built about a year ago. The bones pictured above are of a deer. In the close up below you can clearly see gouge marks (presumably from the big cat's fangs) in the vertebrae below the deers head. I removed the lower jaw of the deer for the purposes of a future exhibit, but half of the corresponding upper jaw and snout was missing. I understand that sometimes Mountain lions will suffocate their prey by crushing that part of the deer by biting down on it to prevent them from breathing.
The area around the bones had been scuffed up with pine needles and other brush scraped in the direction of the carcass. Mountain lions typically cover their kills in this fashion and revisit it over time. Much of the deer was missing, but we have been finding parts of it for some time down by the stream and behind Lisa's house. That would indicate that coyotes, ravens, raccoons and such have been visiting the kill as well.
The scary thing is that the deer carcass is literally 6 feet off of our nature trail. When I built the nature trail I largely followed established game trails, so on most days the trail is littered with animal tracks. The aforementioned biologist, Kevin Brennan, told me that where you have deer and raccoons in the San Jacinto Mountains you also have mountain lions. Not far from the nature trail is the Atipahato Lodge. The Atipahato has a problem with their leach field, which has resulted in profuse green grass spring up not far from where the kill was found. The deer have worn well-traveled trails between the bubbling leach field and nearby streams. These trails criss-cross the nature trail. I theorize that this is why we have the mountain lion hanging out in our neck of the woods. Kevin Brennan told me that people who have trouble with mountain lions coming too close to their homes are often guilty of feeding deer and raccoons. I think that, in effect, the Atipahato is feeding deer by not treating their septic problem.
(The section of trail where we found the kill)
I found more mountain lion tracks yesterday by dead man's cave. Not surprisingly they were found right where a multitude of deer tracks were going down to drink at a small stream that flows in front of the cave.
I called Atiphato and aired my grievances to their manager, and she advised me that she will be sharing my concerns with the owner, but I'm not holding my breath that they will do much about it. I guess I could contact the health department and use that as leverage to get the problem cleared up. Maybe I'm just a little too excited about the whole thing. I could be overreacting.
I like the idea of mountain lions being in the mountains, I just don't wnat them here in my camp. I have been worried about mountain lions for a while, and the topic tends to get me a little excited.
2 comments:
Wow, that could be a little unsettling.
I agree. It's sad that the kids have to be inside without adult presence, but better safe than sorry, eh?
On a more pleasant note, I copied the pictures of the deer skeleton and of the mountain lion paws. I showed them to my class, as we are starting a unit on fossils and let them guess what the animal was.
First the deer. I got: a cobra, a "long neck", brontosaurus,and a T-rex, . oh, and also, the "skinny bird dinosaur that attacks the other ones"
I then showed them the paw prints, and told them that this was the animal that probably killed the other one. To that, one boy,(my probably gifted guy), said,"Oh, then that can't be dinosaur bones because it has paws and those animals didn't live back in the same time as a dinosaur. It is probably the print of a bear or lion or something."
They kept guessing. It was fun. I'm not telling them until Monday.
They pay me to play with these kids' heads!
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