On Sept. 16th, I was up early. Vil had just left for a long day of work in Portland and I couldn't fall back to sleep. The early dawn was breaking to a beautiful sunny day and I was motivated. So was Summit who was clearly trying to tell me that he was interested in a walk. I decided to really treat him and take him up to Rattlesnake Lake and stroll on the Iron Horse Trail, which is a beautiful rails-to-trails area. About 25 minutes in to our walk, his hackles went up and he started getting huffy. I didn't see a thing and assured him it was nothing. 10 minutes later we turned around and headed back. Summit was sniffing and not paying attention, when something caught the corner of my eye. I looked up just in time to watch a cougar cross over the trail, pause on the other side, then quickly disappear in to the grass. Summit didn't see it. I carried on, a little more on alert and kept a watchful eye out. Just before we arrived at the spot where the cat had crossed, Summit started going nuts. He was barking and his fur was standing on end- neck to tail. He was sniffing both sides of the trail and seemed to be following smell as opposed to sight. There was no sign of the cougar. I got home and emailed our cougar biologist/friend. He wasn't surprised and said there had been several credible sightings around that area. FLASH FORWARD to this morning. We woke up to an email from a neighbor. He happened to be looking out his window at about 7:45am and saw what he thought was a golden retriever-but something didn't look right, so he got the binoculars. Sure enough- it was a cougar. He grabbed his camera, just as it crossed the road and took this shot.
Again, I emailed the biologist who told me that it was likely the same one that I had seen. They are very territorial and it would be highly unlikely for 2 sightings, within 10 days, in close proximity, to be different cats. This morning's picture was taken about 200 yards from our home. The elk are in rut and our neighbor had been trying to shoo them out of his yard earlier in the morning(they LOVE young plants). And... cougars think elk are tasty- so there you have it.
Needless to say... there are no deer or elk in the yard this evening. Everything in this neighborhood is on high alert- save for the birds who get the best view of things (oh to fly).
*Amazing photo credits on this one go to our neighbor Rich P.!
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