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...
by yiwei | Oct 31, 2013 | field notes, puma bios, puma ecology, santa cruz pumas
This morning, we learned that 39M, the downtown puma from Santa Cruz, was hit and killed on Highway 17 around Vine Hill Road. When we caught the young male back in May, we recognized that his survival in the coming months would be difficult. After getting his new...
by yiwei | Oct 23, 2013 | field notes, puma bios
The puma project has been on a puma catching spree this last week: we caught 3 different animals in 4 days! Starting Monday last week, we set out 6 road kill deer in two large properties to see what pumas we might attract. Our streak began Wednesday with the capture...
by yiwei | Oct 18, 2013 | field notes, puma bios
On Wednesday night, we captured our newest puma in the Cemex Redwoods using a cage trap. We have had pretty great success with cage traps recently – catching a puma on 3 out of 4 attempts. We weren’t sure if 42M was going to return to the cage because in...
by veronica | Oct 9, 2013 | field notes, puma bios, puma ecology
Weighing in at 84 pounds, and around 14 months old, last week we welcomed 41M to the study. In this video, you can see 41M walk into the trap while his sibling looks on. The door closes behind him, distracting him for a moment, but then he returns to chowing down on...
by yiwei | Aug 28, 2013 | field notes, technology
We were recently alerted to this new video from user CougarMagic on Youtube. The video depicts a mom walking with her two kittens who just stops to let them nurse in front of a camera trap. This is an amazing and very rare glimpse into the family life of pumas....
