On the morning of Dec 24, I got up around 6 am to go through my usual morning routine. I could have slept in a bit since it was a holiday but I wanted to get Gwennie a good morning walk. The previous night, I had to cut her walk short since I was feeling sick. I was worried about falling sick right before our trip to India on Dec 27 but I felt fine this morning and was ready for a good walk with Gwennie. After showering, I went downstairs to eat my oatmeal. I let Gwennie out so she could relieve herself and prepared to eat. I heard two barks and then a horrible loud screeching noise. It was still mostly dark but the porch light was on. I went to look outside and saw Gwennie seemed to be fighting something at our fence. I went outside to try and break up the fight. I figured she had gotten into a scuffle with a racoon. I grabbed our plastic steel-tipped snow shovel as I ran to Gwennie. I looked over the fence and to my shock it was a full grown mountain lion that had his jaws around the back of Gwennie's neck. He had managed to pull Gwennie's head through the narrow 4 inch gap between two wooden fence posts. Without any time to think, I started hitting the mountain lion with the shovel. I hit him in the head and body for about 30 seconds. In hindsight, I am very thankful the mountain lion did not turn his attention to me since I was definitely no match for him. But he just hung onto Gwennie. It was amazing that the lion completely ignored me and hitting him was like hitting a rock. He was pure muscle and so strong. I saw that the shovel was not helping so I went back inside slowly by backing up and keeping eye contact with the lion. I yelled to Gowri, who was sleeping upstairs, that a mountain lion had gotten a hold of Gwennie. She immediately came down and tried throwing various objects at the lion from inside the house. She threw knives, plates, bowls but since even the shovel had no effect this did not help either. She also called 911 and the cops came in 10 minutes. By this time, Gwennie was definitely dead. After just nine months she was taken away from us. It felt like we had been with her for much longer. We told the police that we hoped the lion could be spared. Of course, it wasn't our call to make. The police had to wait to hear from Game and Fish on what to do. Four police officers standing 10 feet from the mountain lion still could not get him to leave his kill. In fact, the lion growled at the officers while hanging onto Gwennie. However, the lion couldn't pull Gwennie through the fence since the opening between the posts was not big enough. For some reason, he never let go to jump over the fence to retrieve Gwennie. A full 30 minutes later, nothing had changed. The lion was still there trying to get Gwennie through the fence. It was torture to watch. Finally, Game and Fish called and said the police should kill the mountain lion since he was just too aggressive. The police had a clear shot so they shot and killed the mountain lion using a shot gun. It was a very sad ending for us since not only were we crushed about Gwennie's death but we also felt terrible for the mountain lion. The mountain lion never made one aggressive move towards me. He just hung onto his kill and took the beating. It gave me so much respect for him. From what we learned later, this was a full grown male lion who could have easily killed me. Gwennie did her job. She protected her family to the death. She was such a gentle creature but when it came to a mountain lion she put up an amazing fight. She also did some damage to the mountain lion which is no easy task. I'm pretty sure she saw that I was trying to help her when I first went out there with the shovel. She was still alive at that point and I hope she saw that I was trying to help and that she wasn't alone. She deserved that.

It looked like my shovel attack actually did a lot of damage to the mountain lion when the police examined the body after shooting it. However, further examination by taxidermist James Brooks determined the shovel only did superficial damage. He found out the lion had quite a story to his life. He was a medium sized male weighing in at over 130 lbs. James estimated his age at 6 years old. A male lion in the prime of his life. Ken Logan a mountain lion expert examined the skull and thought the lion was likely 10 years old. He said this lion would have been very experienced and was in amazing health for his age. Possibly the dominant male in this area since male territories typically do not overalp. The animal control officer at the scene actually thought the lion was a female but apparently it is not easy to tell. The lion had an old bullet wound that had healed almost completely. He also had over 100 porcupine quills that had also been readsorbed into his skin. There was a hole in his skull which was initially a mystery. One eye was cloudy and unusable. Further investigation showed that the hole in the skull was in the shape of a deer hoof. Therefore, James believed that the lion got kicked while stalking a deer from the back. This also likely cost him one of his eyes. Ken Logan believed the hole in the skull was from fighting another male mountain lion. However, such a fight would have usually resulted in other injuries and infection of the wound. This was not the case. Therefore, the hole in the skull will remain a mystery. Despite, all of these prior injuries, the lion was in good health and his injuries had mostly healed. It really gave me a feel for how challenging their lives are and how resilient they are. His teeth and gums were perfect and he was at a good weight. James and Ken believe that the prior injuries did not cause the lion to attack Gwennie. He did not attack because he was weak. They believe it was a combination of the Las Conchas fire and a late frost that killed much of the acorn crop at high altitudes. This resulted in deer and elk, the main food source for mountain lions, to migrate to lower elevations into town where forest was still intact. The mountain lions follow these herds. Simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time likely lead to this unfortunate encounter. Below is a picture of the magnificent mountain lion right after he was shot. The pot near his back is one of the things we threw at him to hope he would leave.

You can also see damage to his head from the shovel and the bigger injury from the deer.

The police carried away Gwennie and the mountain lion from the back of our house. Here is a full body shot of this amazing creature. We also called Sylvia Hush, our pet sitter as events unfolded. She took Gwennie away in her truck to take her to the animal clinic where they could prepare her for cremation. Being Christmas eve, the clinic was closed. However, my close friend George Zyvoloski knew Dr. Dan of the animal clinic. We called him and he immediately came in to help us take care of Gwennie's body. Just two days later we were off to India. News spreads fast in our little town so we were getting calls and emails from our friends and family. However, the story hadn't hit the press yet due to the holidays. The day we left, the story broke and the local paper, the Albuquerque papers and TV stations were interested in talking to us. A mountain lion attack was big news and very rare for Los Alamos county. The police and animal control officers had not heard of a similar incident in Los Alamos. Attacks have happened in the past but people are usually not around to witness them and often no one really knows why a pet goes missing. Almost half our neighbors have dogs so this was really a freak event. We had already left town so my father actually ended up getting interviewed. He gave great interviews. The articles were all very nice. I was bit worried about what people would think about me going out there with a shovel. Tom, the Animal Control officer at the scene (who coincidentally was there when we adopted Gwennie) told Gowri that I was the bravest man in Los Alamos. I wasn't sure if others would come up with the same interpretation. I learned first hand that there is a fine line between bravery and stupidity. Also that things happen very quickly and one doesn't have time to think in this kind of situation. Although, since I didn't know it was a mountain lion when I went out there, I'm not sure if stupid or brave apply to this case. The story continued to make news and even made the national news on NPR. It was a very traumatic experience. Gowri and my mother definitely were traumatized by the experience. I wasn't traumatized maybe because I was the one who went out there and was at risk. I was just super sad about Gwennie and the lion. Aditya who was only 3, luckily slept through the entire incident, and was told that Gwennie had gone to heaven. He seemed ok with that but he came up with an interesting observation. He said we were sad because we didn't get to say goodbye. In many ways he was right, we had expected to spend a lot more time with Gwennie and it felt like 9 months with her was far too short.

Getting away to India definitely helped since while we were home everything reminded us of Gwennie and the attack. After 2 weeks, we returned from India and found so many cards from neighbors, close friends and people we didn't even know expressing their sympathy. It made us feel part of a tightly knit community. Gwennie actually got us much closer to our neighbors. We met so many of them while on our walks. Before we had her, we didn't know most of our neighbors. We also quickly realized that life without a dog is not for us. We definitely are dog people and whatever small risks come along with having one are outweighed by the love and companionship a dog provides. I actually think a dog affects our son Aditya in a very positive way. She was a great role model for him. However, since our attack, three more mountain lions sightings have occurred in different parts of town. Two of these were attempted attacks on dogs. So we are biding our time to see if things settle down. We also will install motion sensor lights in the backyard. Aditya definitely won't be allowed in the backyard any time soon. If we get another dog, she will only be let out in daylight and walked during the day. The current lion problem is likely due to the recent fire and the heavy snow in the mountains forcing deer (the main prey for lion) down to our elevation. Hopefully, the lion problem will diminish and we will find another wonderful dog like Gwennie in the future. In the meantime, Gowri will continue to volunteer at the Animal Shelter. We have actually volunteered to help save wild tigers (see the tiger pictures) and big cats in the past and this will always be one of the causes that we'll support. The Panthera charity (panthera.org) is the one we feel has a lot of promise since they work on establishing corridors for the big cats, linking together protected areas to maintain healthy populations and helping to prevent conflicts with man. I never imagined that we would see first hand what it felt like to be in one of these conflicts. I used to wonder what villagers felt like in India when a tiger attacked and killed livestock or people. In a way, this incident gave me a glimpse of how it must feel. Hopefully Gwennie's death will raise awareness and prevent further incidents from occurring in our town.

UPDATE 2/12/2012: After several months we started looking for another dog. While volunteering at the shelter Gowri went to the vet with a shelter dog and saw an older German Shepherd Collie mix. She had a sweet demeanor very much like Gwennie. On Feb. 19,2012 Steffi (named by Gowri after German tennis player Steffi Graf) joined our family! She immediately got along well with our cats (maybe Gwennie convinced them that all dogs are not bad). She also really dotes on Aditya. With motion sensor lights and never taking her out back during night, dawn or dusk, we hope to prevent another incident. We hope Gwennie is happy that we have taken in one of her kind into our house. Steffi is likely more than 10 years old so as with many older dogs it would have been difficult to find her a home. But she is a great choice for us!

UPDATE 6/5/2012: Taxidermist James Brooks is using the mountain lion for educating the public in Los Alamos on how to live with large predators. He is also conducting a study about the lions in Los Alamos (Click). It made our family happy that some good could come of this incident. James did an amazing job of depicting how majestic this lion was. He was likely one of the dominant males of this area. At the Los Alamos PEEC nature center I got to see the lion and the story James had compiled about his life. It was quite an emotional experience for me. He had pictures from a trailcam that captured pictures of this male mountain lion with his mate. The mate was also photographed with cubs which made me happy that his line will continue. There was also an amazing picture of this lion stalking elk! The trailcam was setup on Caballo peak (behind Barranca mesa) before the fire burned the area. There were even pictures of this lion before and after his eye injury due to being kicked in the head by the elk. It definitely appears that so much burned habitat has forced more mountain lions closer to town although Los Alamos terrain has always been good habitat for them. A few weeks after the PEEC presentation another mountain lion was sighted in our neighborhood and police were called. The lion was gone by the time pollice arrived. In August 2012, Ken Logan, a mountain lion expert and author visited Los Alamos to talk about living with cougars. He visited our house and my parent's house. He said Los Alamos is perfect cougar territory. Steep canyons, large deer and elk populations along with almost every other prey animal for cougars. He was actually surprised that more incidents had not occurred.