Aversion training for lions in Boulder CO

[Emily]

http://dailycamera.com/news/2008/feb/04 ... or-cougar/

Close call for cougar

Hungry lion nearly becomes latest subject of behavioral study

By John Aguilar (Contact)
Monday, February 4, 2008

A cougar that killed a dog in a Boulder backyard last month was to join 10 of its brethren in a months-old wildlife experiment, where mountain lions are collared, tracked and hazed to keep them from becoming habituated to people.

The only problem for the Colorado Division of Wildlife is that the cougar, which made its deadly attack on a dog residing in the 1000 block of Linden Avenue on Jan. 26, escaped the trap set for it.

"The trap closed but there was a mechanical failure and the lion bolted out of it," said Jennifer Churchill, a spokeswoman for the division.

She said the mountain lion had been in a backyard on Linden Avenue gorging on a dead raccoon when the residents at the home let their dog out at 5 a.m. Before they knew it, the cougar pounced on the dog.

Churchill said officials planned to trap the lion and enter it into the Front Range Cougar Pilot Study, which is being conducted in Boulder and Jefferson counties.

The study, which started last spring, has already resulted in the collaring and tracking of 10 cougars for the purpose of learning more about the animals' habits.

It also calls for the use of averse conditioning -- shooting bean bags at the cats or chasing them with hounds -- to instill in the animals a fear of people and human habitats.

"We were going to trap it, relocate it and then haze it," Churchill said.

In October, the division trapped and collared a cougar that had been snatching goats from a yard in Eldorado Springs. They moved the animal -- officially named AM04 for the purposes of the study -- to Golden and hazed it with bean bags as it ran off into the woods.

AM04 hasn't been back to Eldorado Springs to eat more goats, according to the division.

Churchill said the division hasn't received complaints about cougars from the north Boulder neighborhood since the killing last month and doesn't know if the escaped lion has been wandering around its old stomping grounds or not.

But if it is trapped successfully, it could become one of the first cats to join the next wave of the pilot study.

In late January, the county's Parks and Open Space Advisory Committee unanimously voted to allow GPS collars on 10 more cats. The county commissioners must first approve the expansion.

Contact Camera Staff Writer John Aguilar at 303-473-1389 or aguilarj@dailycamera.com.