THE DORIS DUKE CONSERVATION SCHOLARS, a select group of undergrads from U.C. Santa Cruz, showed up at Crooked Creek in August—the White Mountains being one of half a dozen destinations during their eight-week field-based ecology and conservation course. These were garden-fresh college kids from the coast, not quite children but most definitely not adults in any practical sense of the word. In the thick of laying out a seven a.m. breakfast for twenty undergrads and their four adult advisors, just minutes from ringing the bell, I glanced up and noticed several scholars in the dining room in a tense huddle. What caught my eye in particular was one post-pubescent female of eighteen or (maybe) nineteen summers. She was visibly distraught—wild-eyed and gesticulating. I toweled off my hands and walked over. “Hey, what’s up?”
Wild-eyes swiveled towards me. “I…just saw, like…a mountain lion—I think!!” The girl was flushed, breathing hard, animated—full-on lit-up. I gathered from her rapid breathing that she’d come through the door just moments before. The others were staring at her. Agog, as it were. “A lion!” one of them said. “She saw a mountain lion!”
“Really?! You saw a lion? Where?”
Still out of breath: “ I went out…for a run…”
“Where exactly was this?” She pointed southwards. “I went up that hill over there…on the old road…up to that, like, big open area with all the rock outcrops.”
“Yeah, Sagehen Flat. Where were you when you saw the thing?”
Her breathing had slowed somewhat and she seemed to be calming down as the adrenaline dissipated. “I was actually off the road when I saw it. On this, like, sort of a ridge. I wanted to watch the sun rise so I went up there. It was with a little one. I think it was a mother with its baby following right behind her. I was super scared! I know that mothers with their babies can be, like, extra dangerous.”
“How close were you?”
“Well, they were actually pretty far away. I don’t think she saw me but I was really afraid. I ran all the way back without stopping. I couldn’t tell if she saw me or not but I was really afraid that if she did see me, she’d, like, attack.”
“How’d you know it was a lion? How big was it? Did it have a tail?” (I’m thinking, Maybe it was a bobcat.)
“It was really big! I don’t know, like, maybe seven or eight feet long. Yeah, it had a tail…I think. No, it did have a tail. They both did. I’m pretty certain.”
“Hmmm. That’s…that’s big. Are you sure? They were pretty far away, after all. Sometimes it’s hard to tell how big something is when it’s off in the distance.”
Eyes go from wide to wider: “No! It was, like, huge!”
“What color was it?” Thinking: Wow…this girl is reallly pumped-up.
“They were kinda, like, brown, I think.”
“’Kinda brown,’ hmmm. Was the tail long and fat? Could you tell?”
“Yes! I took a picture! With my phone. But they were pretty far off.” She whipped out her phone.
“Well, I very much want to see the picture but, hey, right now I’ve gotta get your breakfast out. Come back and show me when everybody’s done eating.” As I turned to go a new gaggle of concerned scholars closed in and she started retelling her story. This was clearly a very big deal. For her…for all of them. Perhaps one of if not the most thrilling experience to befall this young urbanite—in her entire life thus far. From Lion-girl’s perspective, she had stood at or near death’s door. (Never did catch the young woman’s name; with these big student groups I generally don’t even make an effort.) Her excitement, agitation, exaltation, and primal fear were rubbing off on the whole group.
I fell back into my all-business mode and focused on the job at hand but glanced out at the shifting huddle a couple more times mid-hustle and saw her re-recounting her big adventure. Finally, things were winding down and the cleanup crew started clearing tables and putting away leftovers. I was still racing around when she showed up with her phone, trailed by several classmates—a veritable entourage. Having cheated death before breakfast, Lion-girl had achieved new respect among her peers and was now a sort of star. “Oh, hey, gimme a second.” I was in the middle of directing the post-breakfast show: “No, just throw out those bread heels; no one ever eats them. Condiments go in the kitchen fridge, third shelf, right side. That goes back in the walk-in….” I toweled off my hands again and followed them out into the dining room. She handed me her phone with a triumphant look. I could barely make out two tiny dots in a sea of sagebrush.
“Sorry, I was pretty far away when I took it. I can zoom in….” I handed the phone back and she tweezed the screen before holding it up for me to see. Everybody’s eyes were now on me.
The two dots were now much larger but very granular. I stared at the image for several seconds, giving it my best furrowed-brow squint. “Oh. Wow.” This wasn’t what I’d expected—at all. Mountain lions just don’t walk around in the open during daylight hours so I’d been skeptical at the outset, figuring it was a coyote or maybe a bobcat, even though she thought she’d seen a tail.
“So, it is a lion, and her cub, isn’t it? Or is it ‘kitten’?”
“Ummm…y’know, it’s awful grainy. I can’t tell for sure but from what you described…. I trailed off. “Well, that’s pretty…amazing. Never seen a lion up here, myself, but they’re around for sure. Hey, gotta get back to work. Thanks for showing me that.”
They wandered off and I jumped back into the fray. “Hey, dishwashers, a reminder: plates have two sides. Oh, don’t bother saving those last two bites—eat ‘em or toss ‘em.” A couple of minutes later, I spotted Justin—the group leader—out in the dining room talking with a few scholars. I walked over and when he looked up and met my eye I did the little head toss thing (comes with eye-roll), signaling that we needed to have a private meeting. Nobody was in the kitchen at the moment and Justin followed me into the little nook where the fridge is, the one spot in the kitchen not visible from the dining room. “Hey, Tim, what’s up?”
“Justin, hi, good morning. Uh, the young woman who saw the mountain lion when she went for a run this morning? You’ve heard about this, right?”
“Ohhhh, yeah.” He grinned. “They’re all talking about it.”
“Well, she just showed me the picture on her phone. Justin: it was a cow. She saw a cow and its calf. Maybe you’re aware that Deep Springs College out in Fish Lake Valley runs cattle up here in the summer. They have since the start—part of their program, y’know, the self-reliance thing: growing their own vegetables, running cattle. Apparently they just moved the herd up here in the last few days. I hadn’t spotted any myself so it didn’t even occur to me that that’s what she might’ve actually seen. Hey, I ‘get’ that people who don’t know much about nature don’t know how to judge size—especially at a distance—or have a clue what to look for. And I imagine she wasn’t expecting that cattle might be way up here. But a Hereford cow? The girl said it was ‘brown, I think.’ Herefords are cinnamon-red with big white patches! Not so brown! Kinda caught me off guard and I didn’t know what to say. This is obviously a big deal—probably one of the most thrilling things that’s ever happened to her. Hey, nothing like a little mortal fear to add some sparkle to your day! The poor little thing really did think this giant slathering beast-with-fangs might run her down and rip out her liver. A narrow escape! Her friends got all worked-up, too. What do you think? Should I tell her she ran away from a cow or just let her bask in all the glory?”
Justin burst out laughing at the word “cow” and had been grinning ever since. It was pretty funny, after all. (From this grizzled mountaineer’s perspective, it was a real hoot.) But then, pondering my final words, Justin’s face took on a more serious expression—a half-frown-with-lips-pursed, serious look. Long pause. And he said, slowly, “No…no, don’t say anything. I’ll tell her myself. Later. When the time’s right.”
