The boy suffered bite wounds and scratches his head and neck following the attack, which was reported about 1 p.m. at a hiking trail in an open space preserve near the Silicon Valley city of Cupertino, Lt. Paul Foy of the California Department of Fish and Wildlife said.
He was recovering at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center, where he was listed in fair condition, hospital spokeswoman Joy Alexiou said.
The boy was among a group of 10 — comprised of his parents, another pair of parents and kids — hiking at the Picchetti Ranch Open Space Preserve. The boy's father told investigators his son was about 10 feet ahead of the group when a mountain lion "came out of nowhere" and attacked the boy, Foy said.
Believe it or not, there is a lot of wild-ish country right next to all those big bay area cities, so in a way I'm not surprised by this. By now, literally generations of lions have come and gone that have never been hunted by people, and when you fill the mountains with "slow deer" hiking and chattering in close proximity to hungry predators, this is the result. Maybe twenty years ago, an adult woman who worked in my industry was run down and killed by a lion right in the foothills outside of Sacramento.
Nothing has changed in the meantime.
And some people want to reintroduce Grizzlies to the state.
Predator/prey. You are the prey.
It's a good thing Liberals want to disarm you- someone might get hurt with you shooting at those predators...or something.
ReplyDeleteWhen hiking with my kids (20 years ago) they asked me why I always had my .357. Told them it was incase we encountered predators. Some of which might have four legs. Better to be tried by 12 than be carried by 6.
ReplyDeleteCouple hiking culture with anti-gun culture and you get stuff like this.
ReplyDeleteSame thing for people who walk down dark city streets.