Lions and Tigers and Trespassers?

So 40 acres in the PNW, what could go wrong?  INNUMERABLE things, that’s what (Note the unordered list to follow):

• Bears
• Mountain Lions
• Trespassers with guns
• Crazy neighbors
• Spraining an ankle at the bottom of our 300′ incline hill.
• Eating an incorrectly identified mushroom

Honestly, though the one that keeps me up at night is the mountain lion.  At least for now.  See, I got a trail cam earlier this year.  MERRY XMAS TO ME!  But since I’ve had it out there—and mind you, it’s only been since February that it’s been turned on—I’ve spotted two, maybe 3.  It’s hard to tell if they’re unique or not sometimes. 

Regardless, one of them is VERY BIG.  I call him King Kong.  He might be a lady but since they follow the mammalian trend of males being larger, I’m guessing he’s a male cuz he’s BIG!  I mean big, big!

Thankfully though he’s only come past the camera 1x.

We’ve never come across any of them in the flesh, which is a blessing. But I’m sure we’ve been stalked from the periphery before. I doubt a mountain lion would try it with two 6′ + guys and 80#s of loud ass speedy dog but you never know. I’ve heard people say you never want to see a mountain lion because that’s likely the last thing you’ll ever see. Ambush predators are not my thing. Regardless, here’s a few shots of a juvenile we caught on camera.

Honestly, I think a healthy fear is likely the best thing I can have of these animals. I don’t want to hurt them. I would just like it if we could co-exist and they could have a continued healthy fear of me as I have of them. And, to be fair, there have only been 2 fatal cougar encounters in WA State in 100 years; on top of that there have only been 20 injurious encounters during that same times span so…

*Fingers Crossed?*