Our Town: Waiting for the lion Our Town: Waiting for the lion (November 03, 2004)

by Don Kazak

When a wayward mountain lion was shot out of tree in a quiet residential neighborhood on May 17, the echo of the gunshot reverberated for weeks. Why was the big cat here? Why did it have to die?

Police and residents alike have learned a lot since -- even if they still seem to be having trouble getting neighborhoods alerted in a timely fashion.

When another mountain lion was sighted on a rooftop in another residential area shortly after midnight Oct. 19, more than 12 hours went by before alerts started filtering out. There was little panic but much caution, and the policy has been changed since to expedite matters.

And Palo Alto police now have a policy in place telling officers what to do in different situations.

"We're still learning," Chief Lynne Johnson said. "(Last May) was the first situation like that we've dealt with. They don't teach this at the Police Academy."

People who were upset by the killing of the mountain lion in May will be pleased to learn that officers now have instructions to differentiate between when a lion is an "active threat" or acting passively and perhaps trying to get back to the creek and its natural habitat in the hills.

The new policy, developed after the May incident, gives officers policies to follow in three different situations: a green alert, when there has been a sighting; a yellow alert, when there has been an encounter or an incident, and a red alert, when there has been an attack.

Yellow means officers "should attempt to dispatch a mountain lion when it can be reasonably determined that the lion has been involved in unprovoked aggression toward a human and/or is a threat to public safety."

"Most wildlife experts agree that a mountain lion in a residential area poses a threat," Johnson said.

We're now just starting to deal with the reality of lions amongst us, where they don't belong.

But wildlife experts are not surprised that it's happening.

"It's just not mountain lions, but also coyotes, raccoons and skunks," said Mike Phillips, a wildlife technician with Santa Clara County Vector Control. "It's been slowly coming on over the last 20 years."

Phillips said some people feed wildlife or arrange their yards to make them more accommodating. Some people near greenbelts even leave food out for deer, since it's such a delight to see them.

But little critters attract bigger critters, and lions are at the top of the food chain.

"The animals adapt to us, and then they go after dogs and cats," Phillips said.

He added that when mountain lions leave the familiarity of a creek, "they can get disoriented and wander around."

Deborah Bartens, the city's naturalist, helped shape the city's new policy on dealing with mountain lions in residential areas.

"With wildlife, you can have policies in place, but they do unexpected things," she said. "We have to treat each event the best we can. We're way ahead of where we were in May, when we reacted in disbelief - 'There's a mountain lion on Walnut (Drive)' -- yeah, sure. The level of awareness of this animal has increased, and to me, as a wildlife educator, that's wonderful."

Back in May, the cops were worried about the lion hurting someone and what they could do to prevent that. If a mountain lion was on the move, running at someone, they knew their handguns might not be adequate to stop it.

When the lion was shot out of the tree, it sprang up and dashed about 30 feet before going to ground and dying under some bushes beside a house. And that was after it had been fatally wounded by a high-powered bullet from an assault rifle.

Johnson said the department has rifle-designated officers, and "we make sure there is at least one available."

The lion sighted two weeks ago hasn't shown up again. Johnson thinks it may still be around.

There may be another solution to finding the elusive lion. One of my editors thinks that because I had been right there when the last one was shot -- and had even wandered back and forth under the tree it was in -- the cops could send me out as bait.

That might make some disgruntled readers happy, but ....

Senior Staff Writer Don Kazak can be e-mailed at dkazak@paweekly.com.

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