Nature
PUBLISHED
With more and more urban development going on in the habitat of mountain lions, their populations are becoming progressively more fractured by roads and buildings. This means that humans are having increasingly more run-ins with these magnificent beasts, like this piece of front yard safari caught earlier this week.
The rest of this article is behind a paywall. Please sign in or subscribe to access the full content.Mary L Mines and Peter Rauenbuehler managed to capture this amazing/terrifying video of a mountain lion on their porch in Hillsborough, California. As ABC-7 KGO local news reports, they woke up at 4am local time to loud rustling outside and their three dogs barking. The pair said they heard a short and sharp crack outside, which prompted them to further investigate.
"When I looked through the peephole I thought it was a coyote," Mines told ABC-7 KGO. "And I turned to Peter and I said, 'There's a coyote on our front porch,' because we have a lot here. I opened the door and I looked and I said, 'That's not a coyote, that's a much bigger animal.'"
After turning on their light to see what was going on, they were faced with a feasting mountain lion just feet away from their window. They later said they think that crack was the sound of the big cat snapping the deer’s neck.
Amazingly, their security camera captured a video of the whole thing, showing the huge feline looming over the deer carcass, before dragging it away into the night. Pretty amazing to see, but a sobering reminder of how closely we are sharing this planet with these creatures.
