LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Richard Allen, a Jago Bay resident, reported seeing the silhouettes of three mountain lions on a recent morning in the area of Thurston Lake.
“My property is right across from Thurston Lake and I think a lot of animals live in the lake area because there is no human population,” said Allen. “There's only one house on the whole lake. It's pretty hilly and we see raccoons and things like that.
“But the night in question, just before daybreak, my dog was going crazy. I couldn't get him to stop barking. We got the big flashlight out so we could see what it was he was barking at,” Allen continued. “It looked like three different cats on the side of a hill.”
Allen estimated that the three animals he saw were the size of a small deer or large shepherd dog.
“They were bigger than cats I normally see,” he said. “Just before dawn you couldn't see their colors as much as the outline and the way they were moving.”
It was the second mountain lion sighting reported to Lake County News in south Lake County in recent months.
An earlier report was made in December from Hidden Valley Lake. But investigation by Hidden Valley Lake and California Department of Fish and Wildlife officials did not turn up any evidence of a mountain lion's presence.
But Allen said the presence of mountain lions has been established from time to time in the Lower Lake area.
“I see them in the summer a lot,” he said. “I think they go down to the water at Thurston Lake. They come down from a small mountain, where I think a lot of animals live because there is no (human) population. A friend of mine shot a mountain lion right under his porch that was attacking his personal cat. That was a few years ago, but don't kid yourself. They come down here.”
Joshua Bush, a biologist for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, said what Allen probably saw was a female with two juveniles.
Bush gave no credence to Allen's suggestion that the mountain lions ventured closer to an area of greater human density was linked to the winter drought conditions in Northern California.
“They don't look at people as a source for food,” he said.
“They might just as well have been tracking deer which is their primary prey,” said Kyle Orr, a Fish and Wildlife warden.
The Fish and Wildlife officials generally agree that there is “nothing to worry about” with regard to mountain lions attacking humans during a drought year.
Orr said that at present there is only one mountain lion attack being investigated in Northern California, which occurred in July 2012 in Nevada County.
Presently, Orr said Fish and Wildlife is attempting to verify an attack that reportedly occurred in the past week in Southern California.
But each of the officials contacted say that mountain lion attacks are “extremely rare” and point out that there have been only 15 verified mountain lion attacks on humans since 1890.
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife estimates the population of mountain lions in the state of California at 4,000 to 6,000.
“Our department receives many, many reports of mountain lion sightings and we don't respond to every report of a sighting,” said Lt. Loren Freeman, a Fish and Wildlife warden based in Clearlake Oaks.
Orr said that Allen's sighting of three mountain lions “is not in and of itself a reason for concern.”
With regard to mountain lions becoming more of a threat because of drought conditions, Orr added, “Conditions at this juncture would not cause the mountain lions to venture further than they already do.”
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