The cougar is commonly known by other names including catamount, mountain lion, panther and puma.
Karel Bock/Getty Images/iStockphotoWildlife officials are investigating a mountain lion attack on a woman and her dog that occurred Tuesday afternoon in Trinity County, some 300 miles north of San Francisco, according to a statement from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife Capt. Patrick Foy.
The unusual and violent attack resulted in the woman seeking medical treatment in Redding, while the dog, a Belgian shepherd who intervened to protect her owner, is receiving emergency veterinary care for her injuries.
“I’ve lived here my whole life. I’ve never had anything like that happen,” witness Sharon Houston told Redheaded Blackbelt, a local news blog. "I don’t think I’m going to let my cat outside the house for a good year.”
It all began at around 3 p.m. Tuesday, according to Foy, when a woman driving along Highway 299 stopped near a picnic area near the town of Big Bar. The woman, whose name was not released, began walking her dog along a path when a mountain lion approached and swiped at her, injuring her left shoulder. She screamed, and the dog, who had been walking ahead, immediately returned to defend her owner.
The cougar then turned its attention on the dog. “The mountain lion bit onto the dog’s head and would not let go,” Foy wrote in an email. “The woman attempted to throw rocks, tug, pull, and even attempted to gouge the eyes out of the lion, to no avail.”
The woman ran up to the road to get help, and as it happened, Houston was driving by in her vehicle.
“I saw a woman trying to wave someone down. She was frantic about it,” Houston told Redheaded Blackbelt. Houston described the woman as small and “pretty scraped up,” with a baton in her hand.
When Houston learned that a mountain lion attack was in progress, she jumped out of the car with her pepper spray and also grabbed a stick.
California's Trinity River passes through Big Bar, Calif., where a woman and her dog were attacked by a mountain lion on Tuesday.
Ashley HarrellThe two women returned to the scene in the forest, where Houston witnessed the ongoing struggle, with the mountain refusing to let go of the dog. “She started hitting it with her baton and screaming,” Houston told the news. “She was very determined to stop this mountain lion from attacking her dog, so I couldn’t leave her.”
The mountain lion was attempting to move off the trail and take the dog to another location, according to Foy, when the women found a piece of PVC pipe and began hitting the mountain lion with it, until finally it released the bleeding dog.
As the dog ran off, the mountain lion — which seemed emaciated to Houston and had cloudy eyes — swiped at the women and bared its teeth. Houston pepper sprayed it in the face for what felt like 5 to 10 seconds. “I begged, ‘please work, please work, please work,’” she told the local news.
The mountain lion turned away and headed up the river, Houston recalled, and the women began backing up the hill. The dog’s owner then drove directly to a veterinarian for emergency treatment, according to Foy. “The dog’s condition is guarded,” he wrote, “and it is unknown if she will survive.”
The woman then drove to Redding for the treatment of her own injuries, which included bite wounds, scratches, bruises and abrasions. None of the wounds are life threatening.
Wildlife officers collected samples for analysis, which were delivered to the CDFW Wildlife Forensic Laboratory in Sacramento for processing. The DNA analysis will be used to prove that a mountain lion attack occurred and to identify the assailant, according to Foy, but “initial evidence is strong enough to allow wildlife officers to treat the investigation as a legitimate attack.”
CDFW is working with its partners in an attempt to trap the mountain lion. In the rare cases where mountain lions attack humans, they are usually killed by wildlife officials. There have been 20 such attacks in California since 1986, three of which were fatal.
