New Mexico Man Eaten this Week by Cougar While Skinny Dipping -- OUCH!!

[grymster2007]

Very happily living in Alaska!

Yeah... griz and wolves aren't nearly as worrisome as a 150 lb. cat. Chester, one of my grandcats is about 15 lbs. of absolute terror. He can flat kick my butt. Can't imagine one ten times his size! Yup... big cats are the scariest predator in my book.

[Heraclid]

When I was buying a car, local dealer indicated that he hike to the Alpine area that has several lakes. He has been observed numerous occasions by cougars and three times been stalked.

He observed cougars on numerous occasions - he has no idea whatsoever how many times they observed him. I guarantee you they saw him many times more than he ever saw them.

And what does he call being stalked? Seeing a cougar doesn't mean it's stalking you.

There's no way this guy was stalked three times and knew about it every time. Let's put it this way - if he knew he was stalked three times, he was in fact stalked many more times, and almost surely would have been attacked by now, long before he could report having been stalked three times with no further incident.

The dude was blowing smoke and trying to sell you a car.

[jdscholer]

Here in Oregon, they (mostly urban dwelling non-hunters) voted to ban hound hunting of cougars. In the few years since, cougar populations have exploded, and deer herds have dwindled and in some places almost disapeared. Gee, I wonder if there's a connection? We frequently have cougar sightings right in town, and the surrounding neighborhoods. Nobody killed -Yet.
By their nature, cats are so elusive that very few are killed without hounds, and now the state spends money to trap and kill problem animals that used to be taken by licensed hound hunters. Great system that has been imposed on us rural Oregonians by the more populated urban areas. jd

[ActivShootr]

There's no way this guy was stalked three times and knew about it every time. Let's put it this way - if he knew he was stalked three times, he was in fact stalked many more times, and almost surely would have been attacked by now, long before he could report having been stalked three times with no further incident.

Absolutely. Cats hunt using stealth and suprise. They kill by breaking the neck of their victim, usually right at the base of the skull. Not being able to sneak up on their prey makes them very ineffective hunters.

Chances are if you spot a cat close by, it saw you long before you saw it.

[zahnzieh]

In my opinion, he should have had a dog with him - only way to get advance warning on a cat. Even with a sidearm, these things are so stealthy - they're on you in a flash, usually no time to respond!

[fbrown333@suddenlink]

I have a sister in Or., she had her small dog attacked by a cat last year. The neighbors had seen it and did nothing. It took 143 stitches to close the wounds on the dog cause he faught back. I told my sis to get a gun(she hates guns) she did but some one else got the cat for attempting the same type of attack on their animal. This was about a 2 year old cat(young), basicly he was hungry and looking for an easy meal.
Some day the sheeple will figure out that hunting is a viable way of controlling the population with out the government having to spend millions of dollars every year to get the same results.
They have already proven that the birth control doesn't work(tried it in one of the eastern states but I can't remember which one). They spent a chunk of our money on that one:barf:
When I venture into wild country (any where outside my house) I have at the very least a good knife on me and usually a pistol. Cats are very easy to kill a .22 will kill a cat, but as was stated before they are an ambush hunter so pay attention to your surroundings!!! JMO

[SWMAGMAN]

Our ancestors had the right idea about pacifying an area by killing off the large predators.
What exactly is the point of maintaining species like the the cougar in the lower 48? It's not even close to being threatened let alone endangered when you take the Canadian and South American populations into account.
Just another hare-brained idea cooked up by the environmentalists.
Time to reintroduce a bounty on these dangerous pests and eliminate them IMO.

Its scary to be reminded that sometimes we are not God and master of all that lives and breathes. But there are those of us who prefer that there be animals of this type left on the face of the Earth. Unchecked? No, their populations need to be controlled...Nature's predator/prey balance doesn't always work in today's world. But eliminated? Absolutely not. You are in so much more proportionate danger from cars, slips and falls, sickness, lightning, human predators, etc. as to make this threat infinitessimal. Still, when it happens, it affects us in a primal way and we want to eliminate the threat.

Take appropriate precautions in appropriate areas, and understand the behaviors of dangerous animals if they are in your area. We can be smarter, and minimize the threat, w/o wiping them from the face of the planet.