Since October 2013, when we caught 41M while 46M looked on, we have repeatedly seen the brothers together. However, until just now, there has been no sign of a mom. We wondered if they had perhaps been orphaned, but their mom finally appeared on a fresh deer kill when our team was out tracking 41M a few days ago. In the video below, you can see the mom jumping back and forth across the stream next to her kill. Eventually 41M joined her to feed as well.
Having both 41M and 46M collared before they disperse away from their mom’s territory will allow us to get really valuable information on how pumas establish new territories in the Santa Cruz Mountains. We hope to learn about how dispersing animals interact with human disturbance and if they ever attempt to disperse out of the Santa Cruz Mountains east across the 101 or south toward Monterrey and Big Sur.