Sharing Cougar Habitat

This week's cover story is about two recent encounters with cougars, or perhaps more aptly "a cougar," as it's presumed the incidents in Dayton involved the same animal.

The first event occurred near the bus barn at the high school in late January.

In the predawn hours, a maintenance worker heard something that sounded like an animal being killed in the brush, and Ryan John, enforcement officer from the state's Department of Fish and Wildlife, was called in.

He brought local hounds men with him and pursued the mountain lion along the Touchet River levy until the rain washed the tracks and the trail turned cold.

Three weeks later, John responded to Derek Katsel's report of a cougar in his backyard a mile directly upstream from the site of the first incident.

Concerned about this big cat's unusual tendency to search for prey outside his species' more common preference for deer or even elk and worried about local residents' safety, John decided that "harvesting" the mountain lion was the best course of action.

He later learned from the state biologist who examined the body that the cougar was older and underfed. It's possible the lion was suffering from a disease and in the early stages of succumbing to it.

In either case, the animal probably sought an easy source of food among livestock on the edge of Dayton.

Katsel did the right thing by calling John to the scene, though legally he was in his right to act in self defense and kill the animal on the spot, according to John. The animal, treed by Katsel's hounds, bit one of them in the hip.

Understandably, this and the incident near the school raised concerns about possible attacks against humans, particularly children.

But unless there's a direct threat to life, contacting Fish and Wildlife should be local residents' first response.

Cougar sightings appear to have increased in recent years in Columbia County, a trend wildlife biologists are keeping an eye on.

However, we also feel it's important to keep this recent encounter and the growth in sightings in perspective, lest residents develop an unreasonable fear of mountain lions.

First, a sighting isn't an imminent threat. Merely seeing a wild animal whose habitat we share in growing numbers doesn't mean it is any more likely to target us for an attack.

Anecdotally, the cougar population here seems to be on the rise, possibly as a result of the growing deer population in the foothills of the Blue Mountains. Odds are up that local residents will see them despite knowing the lions themselves would rather not be seen. They have been known to kill deer within 50 yards of rural homes without as much as waking the dwellers inside.

Second, direct attacks on humans remain so rare they are almost nonexistent compared to other threats. The last time anyone was killed by a cougar in Washington state was in 1927, more than eight decades ago.

By comparison, hundreds of people die and thousands more are injured each year in car accidents, yet no one thinks twice about getting in their car every day.

Fear of cougars is a bit like fear of flying. If we don't already know it, we have to constantly remind ourselves that flying is by far the safest mode of transportation known to man.

Statistically, deaths from plane accidents are far fewer than those from car collisions, yet they get a disproportionate amount of attention, precisely because they are so rare.

The same is true for cougar attacks, which get the spotlight because they are uncommon. It's important to be aware of changes in our surroundings and know how to act when running into a wild animal.

For this reason, we have provided some tips from Fish & Wildlife to be better prepared, just in case (see page 11). It's part of our life on the edge of a beautiful wilderness.