Gilroy
– An unexpected encounter between a frightened mountain lion and
some frightened Gilroy residents ended well, thanks to some
old-fashioned ingenuity.
By Lori Stuenkel
Gilroy – An unexpected encounter between a frightened mountain lion and some frightened Gilroy residents ended well, thanks to some old-fashioned ingenuity.
Some residents of Crews Road, near Ferguson Road east of Gilroy and just north of Highway 152, spotted what they thought was a bobcat hanging out in their yard near the foothills.
“The animal was just kind of hunkered down in the grass,” said Henry Coletto, wildlife deputy for the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office. “They saw him, he got scared and ran and hid under a car.”
The yard had plenty of tall grass and some old farm equipment that created a nice hiding spot for the animal, he said.
The residents called on their neighbor, Albert Escobar, who works with Santa Clara County Animal Control.
“He was trying to – as he does in his role as livestock advisor – to help somebody next door with one bobcat, but it wasn’t a cat at all,” said Greg Van Wassenhove, county agriculture commissioner.
Escobar apparently came face-to-face with the hunkered-down mountain lion when he parted the grass to peer underneath the car.
Deputies had three choices, Coletto said. They could either scare the animal away, tranquilize and re-locate it, or euthanize it if it was a threat to humans.
“This cat was what we call a ‘no harm, no foul cat,'” Coletto said. “It’s just out there trying to do its thing. It was not a public safety issue, it was just an animal trying to hide from people.”
Several squad cars from the Sheriff’s department were called out to help scare the animal out of hiding and back into the foothills. Deputies surrounded the mountain lion’s hiding spot on three sides, flipped on their sirens and sent the mountain lion running away. Coletto said the animal was likely a female, between 60 and 70 pounds.
“That’s kind of what I do with the Sheriff’s office, is train the deputies and other people how to deal with these issues,” Coletto said. “Another agency might have gone out there and just shot the cat.”
The mountain lion probably wound up between a quarter-mile and a half-mile down from the foothills while hunting, Coletto said.
“There was also a creek there, so it probably followed the creek,” he said. “There was probably a lot of good hunting in all that grass and with those vehicles.”
There were also probably a lot of good hiding places for the squirrels and other small animals the mountain lion wanted.
Mountain lions actively hunt in the evening and early morning hours in the winter, just like they do in summer, Coletto said, but with the cool weather, can have a hard time finding things to eat.
“The food source is at its lowest point right now,” he said, “so a lot of times they will hunt for longer periods of time.”
