A young shorthaired Australian Shepherd is lucky to be alive after a mountain lion grabbed her by her head and tried to carry her away on her owners’ rural property near Newcastle.
Shelley Williamson told Cowboy State Daily that she and her husband, Robert, were getting ready for church early Sunday when she heard a strange noise and looked out a second-story window into the driveway.
At first, she couldn’t quite grasp what she was seeing.
“Then it dawned on me that she (her dog, Dottie) was lying next to a mountain lion, with her head in the mountain lion’s mouth,” she said.
She tried to make noise to frighten the mountain lion off, but it didn’t work.
“It didn’t even flinch at the noise, I was banging on the window screen and hooting at the mountain lion,” she said.
The encounter ended with Dottie suffering only minor puncture wounds to the top of her head and the underside of her jaw, left by the big cat’s teeth.
There were tense moments, especially when the mountain lion carried Dottie off, at which point Shelley was certain that her dog was doomed.
More Big Cats Than Ever
The Williamsons own about 40 acres in rugged, picturesque country near Oil Creek Road, in the vicinity of the local airport.
The area is rich with wildlife. There are both mule deer and white-tailed deer, and they enjoy hunting on a neighbor’s property.
There are also bobcats, which Shelley enjoys watching.
There’s always been mountain lions now and again; lately they’ve been showing up more frequently.
They’ve been spotted crossing the road and in a neighbor’s driveway, and trail cameras have caught video and photos of them in various locations.
The Williamsons and some of their neighbors think a family of mountain lions might have moved in, perhaps a female with at least two subadult offspring.
Deer are a favorite prey of mountain lions, and a buck was recently killed on a neighboring property.
“The mountain lions took down a white-tail, a pretty big buck. He (the neighbor) thought it had been poached, so he called Game and Fish to come look at it. They told him it had been taken down by a mountain lion,” Shelley said.
An increase in the mountain lion population around Newcastle makes sense, in light of a broader pattern of the big cats reclaiming more territory. Biologists say they’ve been pushing eastward, even into prairie habitat.
‘Our Dog Is Gone’
The Williamsons spend their winters in Arizona. They picked up Dottie there as a rescue, Shelley said. Dottie is about a year old now.
“She’s pretty quick. She likes to chase and play tag with the domestic cat on our property,” Shelley said.
Dottie is also vigilant and usually barks at any sign of trouble.
“She was really, really quiet that morning (of the attack). That lion must have snuck up on her,” Shelley said.
After she saw the mountain lion with Dottie’s head in its mouth, she and Robert both scrambled to retrieve firearms.
Robert went outside and tried to spook the mountain lion by honking one of their vehicles’ horns.
That didn’t work, but the cat was startled when he fired up the engine.
It got up and started moving away, with Dottie still in its mouth.
“She was dangling, our dog wasn’t even touching the ground,” Shelley said.
She couldn’t get a clear shot with her pistol as the mountain lion moved off.
“I told Robert, ‘She’s gone. The mountain lion took her down to the next plateau. Our dog is gone,’” she said.
Though the situation seemed hopeless, Robert started driving the pickup to the lower section of the property.
Dottie Escapes
Robert was on his way back up the driveway when Dottie made her presence known.
“We heard her bark, and we knew she was still alive,” Shelley said.
“Robert spotted the lion by a boulder, still hanging on” to Dottie, but the dog’s head was no longer in its mouth, she said.
Then Dottie managed to squirm out of the mountain lion’s grasp and made a run for the house.
“The mountain lion returned to the house briefly, as if “it was still trying to look for the dog,” Shelley said.
It finally left, and they haven’t seen it again since. They think it’s still around.
Occasionally, Dottie seems to catch a whiff of the big cat’s scent, “and she’ll growl,” Shelley said.
They’re still not sure why the mountain lion didn’t just bite down on Dottie’s skull or break her neck.
“My husband said, ‘he was almost playing with her, like a housecat plays with a mouse,’” she said.
Calling In Houndsmen
Since the encounter with the mountain lion, Shelley said they don’t let Dottie out alone and “anywhere we’re going now on the property, we have a gun in hand.”
Their grandchildren are no longer allowed to hike around the place without an adult, she added.
Shelley said she’s connected with a local houndsman or a hunter who uses trained hounds to pursue mountain lions.
The Williamsons hope the hunters can at least convince the mountain lions to leave and seek new territory.
“They going to go out to try chasing it on Friday, to see what they can do,” Shelley said.
Mark Heinz can be reached at mark@cowboystatedaily.com.
