by jsmith | Nov 29, 2014 | media, pumas in the news, santa cruz pumas
A UCSC Cruz Alert was sent out on November 28 warning of two mountain lions spotted near the base of the UCSC campus. Mountain lions do occasionally move through campus property, due to the many preserved acres of land in Upper Campus and Pogonip, and the adjacency of...
by cwilmers | Jul 5, 2014 | puma ecology, video
We recently captured this rare footage of a mountain lion killing a deer fawn in front of one of our remote cameras. Notice that the puma is holding the neck of the fawn and the fawn occasionally tries to wriggle free. This appears to be the strategy by which pumas...
by paulh | Mar 22, 2014 | field notes, santa cruz pumas, Uncategorized
We frequently receive calls and messages from local landowners telling us about a fresh-dead deer in their yard. This is fascinating information and helpful to our research – we’ve trapped and collared several mountain lions in this way. In many cases, the...
by paulh | Dec 21, 2013 | field notes, puma ecology, santa cruz pumas
A trail camera we have posted at a puma scent marking site caught this brief glimpse into the busy life of a mother puma. Believe it or not, despite hundreds or thousands of trail camera videos of pumas traveling, this is the first one we’ve captured of...
by paulh | Nov 7, 2013 | field notes, puma bios, santa cruz pumas
Lion 23F gave birth to a litter of kittens about 4 weeks ago near Forest of Nisene Marks State Park. Our team visited her current nursery site today and found 2 feisty 5 ½ pound kittens, known to our project now as 44M and 45M. We briefly handled them to fit them...